A Declaration of Interdependence: A New Global Ethics

Faith Without Frontiers by John M. Allegro Perestroika and Humanism in China by Paul Kurtz Japanese Secularism by Kenneth K. Inada Unity and Dissension in Islam by Abdul H. Raoof

Christian Soldiers March Woody Allen's on Latin America Interview with by Merrill Collett Billy Graham

"we

also: The Last Temptation of Christ FALL 1988, VOL. 8, NO. 4 Free bushy') ISSN 0272-0701 Contents

3 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 16 ON THE BARRICADES 58 IN THE NAME OF GOD 4 A DECLARATION OF INTERDEPENDENCE: A NEW GLOBAL ETHICS 8 EDITORIALS Misconceptions About Secular Humanism, Tim Madigan / Miscegenation and Intermarriage, Vern Bul- lough / Theological Reflections in a Traffic Jam, R. Joseph Hoffmann 10 Woody Allen Interviews The Reverend Billy Graham 12 Coping with Grief: "Dear Helen Williams ..." 14 The Tenth Humanist World Congress BELIEF AND UNBELIEF WORLDWIDE 18 Faith Without Frontiers John M. Allegro 26 Perestroika and Humanism on China Paul Kurtz 28 Japanese Secularism: A Reexamination Kenneth K. Inada 34 Unity and Dissension in Islam Abdul H. Raoof 37 Christian Soldiers March on Latin America Merrill Collett 43 VIEWPOINTS Organized Religion Not Required for Moral Life, William Edelen / A Garden of Cosmic Delights—The New Age Marketplace, Pat Linse and Al Seckel / More from Hook and Homnick / Robert G. Ingersoll and the Fundamentalists of His Day, Philip Mass / Atheism on Campus, Gordon Stein 51 BOOKS "Love Addiction," William F. Ryan / Joseph Campbell and Myth, Thomas Franczyk I Books in Brief 54 FILM "The Last Temptation of Christ" R Joseph Hoffmann

Editor: Paul Kurtz Senior Editors: Vern Bullough, Gerald Larue Associate Editors: Doris Doyle, Steven L. Mitchell, Lee Nisbet, Gordon Stein Managing Editor: Tim Madigan Assistant Editors: Mary Beth Gehrman, Valerie Marvin Contributing Editors: Robert S. Alley, professor of humanities, University of Richmond; Paul Beattie, Unitarian Church, Pittsburgh; Jo-Ann Boydston, director, Dewey Center; Paul Edwards, professor of philosophy, Brooklyn College; Albert Ellis, director, Institute for Rational-Emotive Therapy; Roy P. Fairfield, social scientist, Union Graduate School; Joseph Fletcher, theologian, University of Virginia Medical School; Antony Flew, philosopher, Reading University, England; R. Joseph Hoffmann, chairman, Department of Philosophy and Religion, Hartwick College, Oneonta, N.Y.; Sidney Hook, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, NYU; Marvin Kohl, philosopher, State University of New York College at Fredonia; Jean Kotkin, executive director, American Ethical Union; Ronald A. Lindsay, attorney, Washington, D.C.; Delos B. McKown, professor of philosophy, Auburn University; Howard Radest, director, Ethical Culture Schools; Robert Rimmer, author; Svetozar Stojanovic, professor of philosophy, University of Belgrade; Thomas Szasz, psychiatrist, Upstate Medical Center, Syracuse; V. M. Tarkunde, Supreme Court Judge, India; Richard Taylor, professor of philosophy, Union College; Sherwin Wine, North American Committee for Humanism Editorial Associates: Jim Christopher, Fred Condo Jr., Thomas Flynn, Thomas Franczyk, Robert Basil, James Martin-Diaz, Andrea Szalanski Executive Director of CODESH, Inc.: Jean Millholland Systems Manager: Richard Seymour Typesetting: Paul E. Loynes Audio Technician: Vance Vigrass Staff: Steven Karr, Jacqueline Livingston, Anthony Nigro, Alfreda Pidgeon

FREE INQUIRY (ISSN 0272-0701) is published quarterly by the Council for Democratic and Secular Humanism (CODESH, Inc.), a nonprofit corporation, 3159 Bailey Avenue, Buffalo, NY 14215. Phone (716) 834-2921. Copyright 01988 by CODESH, Inc. Second-class postage paid at Buffalo, New York, and at additional mailing offices. National distribution by International Periodicals Distributors, San Diego, California. Subscription rates: $20.00 for one year, $35.00 for two years, $48.00 for three years, $3.75 for single copies. Address subscription orders, changes of address, and advertising to: FREE INQUIRY, Box 5, Buffalo. NY 14215-0005. Manuscripts, letters, and editorial inquiries should be addressed to: The Editor, FREE INQUIRY, Box 5, Buffalo, NY 14215-0005. All manuscripts should be accompanied by two additional copies and a stamped, self-addressed envelope. Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the editors or publisher. Postmaster: Send address changes to FREE INQUIRY, Box 5, Buffalo, NY 14215-0005. otherwise) would be called a satisfier by Thorndike, a reinforcer by Skinner and a reward by any other name. Letters All of this may be more coherent in textual form; I don't know. Bainbridge says he lacks belief himself, but the personal existential angst (e.g., man, the courageous Is Religiosity Pathological? species, reaching out for the "most sublime," that is, eternal life) that comes through in Albert Ellis is courageous enough to take if true, strengthens my belief that Ph.D.s his FREE INQUIRY article makes me wonder on the majority of the world's population, should be revocable). This, however, just and leads to the following comment: and I admire him for that. How many people seems too shallow an explanation for the The Stark and Bainbridge theory of reli- out there are arrogant (in the positive sense) thousands of people in this "scientific-yet- gion seems to be an argument based on the and blunt enough to publicly point out the devout" category. incredulity of the authors, rather than on obvious pathological aspects of religion and deductions from a "few propositions about religiosity? I applaud Ellis for a frank, lucid Hans G. Machel humans and the world we inhabit." It ap- analysis of this subject (Spring 1988). He Edmonton, Alberta pears that Bainbridge says they cannot also points out which parts of his article are imagine that belief in the supernatural could hypotheses that are not cast in stone, but ever become an outmoded belief (because subject to verification, scrutiny, and/or Liberated by Humanism there are no viable alternatives) and finally modification. Way to go! become recognized by most humans for what Being a secular humanist, skeptic, and Although I have never been a clergyman, it actually is—nonsense. Therefore they de- scientist, I am firmly in agreement with I can agree with Thomas Vernon's "Kicking clare that this development is impossible. almost every aspect of Ellis's analysis. One the Religion Habit" (Summer 1988). When Are we humans really just victims of particular area, however, is dealt with weak- I decided to disencumber myself many years learned helplessness? Marvin Minsky (1986), ly, if not unsatisfactorily. I keep wondering ago (after a long build-up of dissatisfaction), in his book Society of Mind, says: "What how any true scientist can also be a devout I escaped the withdrawal syndrome; rather, are those old fierce beliefs in spirits, souls, believer in religion or religiosity as the terms I was euphoric and have remained so. For and essences (anyway) but insinuations that are used in Ellis's sense. In his article, Ellis the first time in my life I could read "forbid- we are helpless to improve ourselves?" Do states that "while people may be both den" literature, challenge and disregard ir- the data actually support this conclusion? scientific and vaguely or generally religious relevant dogmas, think independently and (as, for example, many liberal Protestants weigh matters objectively, ignore meaning- James E. Du Ruz and Reform Jews), it is doubtful whether less taboos, and freely disagree with church Seattle, Wash. they may simultaneously be thoroughly paper and pulpit garbage—all without nag- devout and objective." How does this state- ging guilt. I can best describe the sensation ment apply to people like Charles Darwin, as being comparable to having experienced The question, "Is Belief in the Supernatural Albert Einstein, and the many other first- glorious relief after a prolonged bout with Inevitable?" can be answered simply and rate scientists who are also religious? Where constipation. directly: Yes, so long as there are people who is the borderline between being objective, accept superstitions without exercising their rational, and scientific, and being subjective, F. Mark Davis reasoning powers, who are ignorant of basic irrational, and unscientific (that is, reli- Chico, Calif. logic, and who are afraid to be skeptical. gious)? Furthermore, to stretch this argu- ment beyond Ellis's limited context, how do Russell E. Simmons scientists like Harold Puthoff and Russell On Belief in the Supernatural Raton, N.M. Targ from the Stanford Research Institute fit into the above citation? Both have made Perhaps it is unfair to be critical of the Stark significant contributions to science. Yet they and Bainbridge theory of religion (Spring William Sims Bainbridge might not be so are highly irrational, as demonstrated, for 1988). After all, the "nutshell" version by pessimistic about man's ability to live with- example, by their questionable actions and Bainbridge is, by his own admission, "a very out religion if he realized that secularism is ridiculous statements in their investigation sketchy outline." He says, on the other hand, not just a modern phenomenon. According of the "powers" of Uri Geller (see James that "the central ideas (of the theory) should to British anthropologist Mary Douglas, Randi, The Truth About Uri Geller, Prome- be clear enough." "The idea that primitive man is by nature theus Books, 1982). It is not really clear to me, however, how deeply religious is nonsense. The truth is that In other words, using Ellis's hypothesis a theory based on concepts involving instinc- all the varieties of skepticism, materialism, in its extended version, if one accepts that tual drives, tension reduction (homeostasis), and spiritual fervor are to be found in the religiosity is paired with lack of objectivity the law of effect (seeking rewards, avoiding range of tribal societies" (Natural Symbols: and hence with irrationality, how do Darwin, punishment), self-awareness, functionalism Explorations in Cosmology, Random Einstein, Puthoff, Targ, and others of their (Skinnerian and Durkeimain), exchange House, 1972). Nomadic peoples, in particu- ilk fit into Ellis's hypothesis? Or do they? theory, and so on, explains religion as a lar, who must do business frequently with One may argue that Darwin lost much of system of "general compensators" based on strangers, seem to be completely secular in his "devoutness" as he grew older, and that supernatural assumptions that are, in turn, their philosophical outlook. Puthoff and Targ became irrational after inevitable. Incidentally, I suppose what Bain- Granted, the decline of traditional reli- they produced some decent science (which, bridge calls a compensator (general or (Continued on p. 56)

Fall 1988 3 This Declaration, drafted by Paul Kunz, is based in part on his editorial, "The Twenty-First Century and Beyond: The Need for a New Global Ethic, " which appeared in FREE INQUIRY, Spring 1988. It also draws on various statements published in the symposium "Entering Our New World: Humanism in the Twenty-First Century" in the Summer 1988 issue.

A Declaration of Interdependence: A New Global Ethics

Preamble of human discovery and achievement. The world is divided into diverse ethnic and national com- There is a compelling need to define and proclaim a new global munities; each of us has specific moral obligations incumbent ethics for humankind. on his or her role in these communities. There are, however, It is dramatically clear today that our earth is made up basic moral decencies that are commonly recognized as binding of interdependent nation-states and that whatever happens on in virtually all civilized communities of the world. These ethical one part of the planet affects all the rest. Whenever human principles embody the collective heritage of humankind. They rights are violated, all of humanity suffers. The basic premise have been tested in the crucible of human experience by their of this global ethics is that each of us has a stake in developing consequences for human good. They include the need to be a universal moral awareness, each of us has a responsibility truthful; to keep our promises; to be sincere, honest, loyal, and to the world community at large. dependable; to act with good will; to forbear from injuring other persons or their property; to be beneficent, compassionate, and I. The Need for a Global Moral Consensus fair; to show gratitude; to be just, tolerant, and cooperative; and to use peaceful methods to negotiate differences. We who endorse this Declaration begin with the conviction These ethical principles have all too often been applied that every human person is equal in dignity and value. We selectively only to the members of a cohesive group—whether wish to encourage the development of free, democratic, and tribal, ethnic, national, racial, or religious. Moreover, com- pluralistic institutions that promise individuals opportunities petition among groups has often engendered animosity and to pursue their personal goals, express their talents, and realize hatred. It is time that we clearly enunciate these ethical their unique visions of the good life. principles so that they may be extended toward all members We wish to maximize human freedom, the autonomy of of the human family living on this planet. the individual, and personal creativity. We believe in mitigating The great religions of the past have often preached universal human suffering and in ensuring positive social conditions so brotherhood. Unfortunately, intolerant or divisive faiths have that all people will have the opportunity to achieve happiness made this moral ideal almost impossible to implement. Narrow and the fullness of life. We do not defend unbridled license; parochial doctrines of salvation have made it difficult for those rather, we encourage moral growth and the highest reaches outside particular denominations to be fully entitled to moral

4 FREE INQUIRY consideration from those within. Secular political ideologies from harassment, (c) freedom of thought and conscience, (d) have likewise asserted the universality of their ideals, yet they freedom of speech and expression, and (e) moral freedom to have often resorted to force to impose their views on those express one's values and pursue one's lifestyle so long as it who differ with them. does not harm others or prevent others from exercising their In recent centuries nation-states have emerged, each a law rights. unto itself, each exercising unlimited sovereignty over those 5. The right to privacy, which means that the rights of living within its defined territorial boundaries. For a long time others should be respected regarding: (a) confidentiality, (b) national self-determination was considered progressive, for it the control of one's own body, (c) sexual preference and liberated ethnic groups from foreign domination. With the orientation, (d) life stance, (e) reproductive freedom, (t) birth decline of colonialism, new countries have come into being— control, (g) health care based on informed consent, and (h) the there are now more than 150 nation-states. National govern- right to die with dignity. ments can play constructive roles in maintaining a system of 6. The right to intellectual and cultural freedom, including law and order and can encourage economic prosperity and (a) the freedom to inquire and to engage in research, (b) the cultural development within their own boundaries. They can right to adequate education, (c) the right to cultural enrichment, help to achieve conditions of harmony and enrichment for and (d) the right to publish and express one's views. the people living under their jurisdiction. 7. The right to adequate health care. Regrettably, however, many nation-states have violated the 8. Freedom from want, which means that society should rights of their citizens, or they have resorted to violence to achieve guarantee (a) the right to work, (b) the satisfaction of basic their purposes: the bloody wars of history demonstrate that the needs when individuals are unable to provide for themselves, "rule of the jungle" often prevails on the international level. (c) care for the elderly, (d) care for the handicapped, and (e) For there does not as yet exist a body of world law, universally the right to adequate leisure and relaxation. recognized and respected by all countries of the globe and 9. Economic freedom, including (a) the right to own supported by the force of law on a transnational level. property, (b) the right to organize, and (c) protection from Economic rivalries between nation-states, regional blocs, fraud. and multinational corporations dominate the world scene. 10. Moral equality, which entails equal opportunity and National budgetary, taxation, trade, commerce, and fiscal and equal access. economic-development policies are made in haughty isolation, 11. Equal protection under the law, which is vital in a free without concern for their effect on the global community. society: (a) the right to a fair trial, (b) the right to protection Fortunately, efforts have been made toward economic and from artibrary arrest or unusual punishment, and (c) the right political regional cooperation. There have been pacts and to humane treatment. treaties between countries and regions. Rules of civilized be- 12. The right to democratic participation in government, havior have emerged to govern these interactions, recognizing which includes a full range of civil liberties: (a) the right to mutual interests. Unfortunately, they do not go far enough. vote, (b) the legal right of opposition, (c) the right of assembly The negative consequences of nationalistic chauvinism have and association, and (d) the right to hold religious beliefs or been vividly demonstrated: balance-of-power politics and eco- not to hold such beliefs. nomic exploitation, racial strife and religious bigotry, hatred 13. The rights of marriage and the family: (a) the right to and violence. marry or cohabitate, (b) the right to divorce, (c) the right to There is an urgent need to develop new political, economic, practice family planning, (d) the right to bear and raise children, cultural, and social institutions that will make possible the and (e) the right to adequate child care. peaceful coexistence and cooperation of the various regions 14. The right of children to be protected from abuse and of the globe. Before this can be fully achieved, however, it physical or cultural deprivation. is essential that we reach a genuine worldwide ethical consen- sus that recognizes our responsibilities and duties to the world III. Human Responsibilities community. Concomitant with the recognition of universal rights is the II. Human Rights obligation of individuals to develop moral responsibilities. Individuals have responsibilities to themselves, to their own The beginnings of a global ethics are now evident. Universal health care, their economic well-being, and their intellectual declarations of human rights enunciate the rights of all human and moral growth. A person has a basic duty to become all beings. We strongly support these declarations. We here reaf- that he or she is capable of, to fully realize his or her talents firm the following: and capabilities. 1. All persons are born equal in dignity and value. Individuals also have responsibilities to others: Parents have 2. They are entitled to rights and freedoms without any the responsibility to bring up their children and provide them distinction of sex, race, language, religion, politics, creed, with food, shelter, love, education, and cultural enrichment. national or social origin, property, or birth. Children have concomitant duties to discharge in regard to 3. The right to personal security and self-protection. their parents, to love, honor, and support them, and to help 4. The fundamental right to personal liberty. This includes: care for them when they are sick or elderly. Two individuals (a) freedom from involuntary servitude or slavery, (b) freedom who have freely entered into marriage or cohabitation have

Fall 1988 5 duties to each other so long as the relationship is viable. Moral commercial exploitation. Critics warn that we might be opening devotion does not depend solely on blood-ties, but extends a Pandora's Box. Proponents reply that although we must be to those with whom one has developed ties of friendship. alert to possible abuses, each new scientific advance in history Similarly, we also have moral responsibilities to others in the has had its prophets of doom. smaller communities in which we have everyday relationships: The frontiers of space exploration continue to beckon teacher and student, shopkeeper and customer, doctor and humankind. We have hurled satellites to the moon, to the patient, factory worker and consumer, and so on. There are planets, and even beyond our solar system. Scientists tell us also duties and obligations that we as citizens have to the towns that it is technologically feasible to build space colonies and and nation-states in which we live and work. to mine other planets. The possible adventures in space that Last but not least is the need to recognize that each of await us are truly Promethean in dimension. Computers and us has responsibilities to the world community, for each of other electronic media facilitate instantaneous communication us is (a) a member of the human species, (b) a resident of to all corners of the planet. Yet in many countries the mass the planet Earth, and (c) an integral part of the world media or organs of propaganda often abdicate their respon- community. sibilities by feeding the public a diet of banalities. It would be appropriate for the citizens of each nation or We face a common challenge to develop scientific education region of the world to add the following affirmation to their on a global scale and an appreciation for critical intelligence pledges of loyalty: and reason' as a way to solve human problems and enhance human welfare. 3. The awesome danger of thermonuclear war is held in I pledge allegiance to the world community, of which we are check only by the fear of "mutually assured destruction." For- all a part. tunately, the great powers have entered into an era of negotia- I recognize that all persons are equal in dignity and value. tion for the reduction of nuclear arms, which is welcomed by I defend human rights and cherish human freedom. men and women of good will. Still, these negotiations are no I vow to honor and protect the global ecology for ourselves and substitute for a broader diplomacy that promotes more funda- for generations yet unborn. mental understanding and cooperation. We have not yet learned how to control warfare, for there does not exist any super- national sovereignty with sufficient power to keep the peace IV. The Ethics of the World Community between nation-states. We submit that it is imperative that such a sovereignty be created. The United Nations has made valiant Humanism, we believe, can play a significant role in helping attempts to develop transnational political institutions—but so to foster the development of a genuine world community. We far with limited success. We recognize that in this quest for recommend the following for consideration. a world community, we will need to guard against the emergence 1. Moral codes that prevail today are often rooted in ancient of an all-powerful nondemocratic global state. We believe, parochial and tribal loyalities. Absolutistic moral systems however, that it is necessary to create on a global scale new emerged from the values of the rural and nomadic societies democratic and pluralistic institutions that protect the rights of the past; they provide little useful guidance for our post- and freedoms of all people. As a first step, humankind needs modern world. We need to draw on the best moral wisdom to establish a system of world law and to endow the World of the past, but we also need to develop a new, revisionary Court with enough moral force that its jurisdiction is recognized ethics that employs rational methods of inquiry appropriate as binding by all the nation-states of the world. to the world of the future, an ethics that respects the dignity 4. The disparities in economic wealth between various por- and freedom of each person but that also expresses a larger tions of the globe widen. Economic development in the Third concern for humanity as a whole. The basic imperative faced World is now virtually stagnant. Massive debts to foreign banks, by humankind today is the need to develop a worldwide ethical runaway inflation, and uncontrolled population growth place awareness of our mutual interdependence and a willingness to a heavy burden on fragile economies and threaten to bankrupt modify time-hardened attitudes that prevent such a consensus. the world's monetary system. We believe, however, that the 2. Science and technology continue to advance rapidly, pro- more affluent nations have a moral obligation to increase viding new ways to reduce famine, poverty, and disease and technological and economic assistance so that their less to improve the standards of living for all members of the human developed neighbors may become more self-sufficient. We need family. The great imperative is to extend the benefits of the to work out some equitable forms of taxation on a world- scientific revolution to every person on earth. We need to guard wide basis to help make this a reality. against the population explosion, the destruction of the en- 5. Economic relations today are such that many corpora- vironment, and the reckless use of technology. We disagree tions are multinational in scope, and some of these have been with those fearful voices seeking to censor science and thus successful in promoting intercultural tolerance. All regions of limit future discoveries that can provide great benefits for the globe—socialist and nonsocialist alike—are dependent upon humankind. Biogenetic and neurobiological engineering hold the continued flow of world trade to survive. Interest rates, enormous promise; yet such research is extremely controversial. deficits, capital investments, currency and stock market New reproductive technology calls for new legal and ethical fluctuations, commodity prices, and import quotas in any one thinking to protect the rights of the people involved and avoid nation can influence trade on a global scale. The loss of industry

6 FREE INQUIRY in some countries and the consequent rise in unemployment 8. We all inhabit the same globe; we have a vital stake are a direct function of the ability to be productive and to in helping to preserve its ecology. The contamination of the compete effectively for international markets. atmosphere, damage to the ozone layer, deforestation, the The governments of the separate nations nevertheless con- pollution of the oceans, the increase in acid rain, the greenhouse tinue to prepare their budgets in haughty isolation and primarily effect, and the destruction of other species on this planet in terms of national self-interest. Full-scale cooperation among adversely affect us all. We urge the establishment of an inter- countries is still limited, and competitive rivalries rule the day. national environmental monitoring agency and recommend the A new global economic system based on economic cooperation development of appropriate standards for the disposal of and international solidarity needs to emerge. industrial waste and for the control of toxic emissions. The 6. The vitality of democratic societies over authoritarian time has come to sound the alarm before the global ecological or totalitarian regimes has been vividly demonstrated. Demo- system deteriorates further. We have a clear duty to future cratic institutions make possible higher standards of living and generations to curtail excessive population growth, to maintain provide more opportunities for creativity and freedom than a healthy environment, and to preserve the earth's precious their alternatives. Genuine political democracy still eludes much resources. of the world; unfortunately, many countries are ruled by dicta- The overriding need is to develop a new global ethics— torial or authoritarian elites that deny their citizens basic human one that seeks to preserve and enhance individual human free- rights. We need to firmly defend the ideals of political democ- dom and emphasizes our commitment to the world community. racy on a worldwide basis, and to encourage the further exten- Although we must recognize our obligations and responsibilities sions of democracy. to the local communities, states, and nations of which we are 7. Each of the regions of the world cherishes its own citizens, we also need to develop a new sense of identity with historical ethnic traditions and wishes to preserve its national the planetary society of the future. identity. We should appreciate the richness and diversity of As we approach the twenty-first century, we need to ask: cultures, the values of pluralism and polyethnicity. Yet we How can we work cooperatively to create a peaceful and urgently need to enlarge our common ground. We should en- prosperous world where competing national allegiances are courage the intermingling of peoples in every way we can. transcended? How can we confer dignity upon all human beings? Continuing scientific, artistic, and cultural exchanges are vital. How can we build a genuine world community? The right to travel across national borders should be defended We who endorse this Declaration dedicate ourselves to the as a human right. Intermarriage can help unify the world more realization of its enduring ideals. Although we may not agree solidly than can conventional politics and those who intermarry with every provision of this statement, we support its overall should not be considered the pariahs of society but rather purpose and call upon other men and women of good will harbingers of the new world of tomorrow. to join us in the furthering its noble aims.

A Declaration of Interdependence: A New Global Ethics has been signed by the following Humanist Laureates of the Academy of Humanism. It has been endorsed by the Board of Directors of the International Humanist and Ethical Union and the Tenth World Congress of the International Humanist and Ethical Union, which met July 30 to August 4, 1988 at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Isaac Asimov, author Paul Kurtz, Professor of Philosophy, State University of Mario Bunge, Professor of Philosophy, McGill University New York at Buffalo Bonnie Bullough, Dean of Nursing, State University of Gerald Larue, Professor Emeritus, University of Southern New York College at Buffalo California Vern Bullough, Dean of Natural and Social Sciences, Jean-Claude Pecker, Professor of Astrophysics, Collége de State University of New York College at Buffalo France Jose Delgado, Professor, Center for Neurological Max Rood, Professor of Law and Former Minister of Research, University of Madrid Justice of Holland Joseph Fletcher, Professor Emeritus of Medical Ethics, Svetozar Stojanovic, Professor of Philosophy, University University of Virginia Medical School of Belgrade Adolf Griinbaum, Andrew Mellon Professor of Philo- E. O. Wilson, Professor of Sociobiology, Harvard sophy, University of Pittsburgh University Herbert Hauptman, Nobel Laureate; Professor of Bio- physical Science, State University of New York at Buffalo

Fall 1988 7 A third misconception involves the moral- ity of secular humanism. Many people seem Editorials to think our motto is, "If it feels good, do it." Actually, my life is not anywhere near as exciting as that! We hold that morality arises from human situations—it is not god-given. Humanism is not a closed, dogmatic Misconceptions About Secular worldview. We try to gear our views to the available evidence, rather than vice versa. However, many people who are used to a Humanism dogmatic way of thinking find it impossible to understand that the Humanist Manifes- tos are not our sacred texts. They are simply Tim Madigan guidelines, to be amended or even discarded if the situation warrants it. Indeed, I would n my travels as National Coordinator for therefore Methodists must be Baptists." It guess that most secular humanists have never I the Secular Humanist Societies and as is also held by some people that the Com- even read these two documents. a frequent guest on radio call-in shows, I've munist Manifesto and the Humanist Mani- The final misconception I'll mention is found that many people do not have a clear festos I and II are virtually the same, which the belief that humanists worship mankind. conception of what secular humanism is. shows that the speakers either have not read We are far too realistic for that. We recog- They are aware, of course, that such a posi- the documents in question or are unable to nize that all humans have the potential to tion exists, but their familiarity with it comprehend what they have read. perform acts of great kindness, but we realize generally comes from the statements of hu- Obviously, the word manifesto sets them that the potential exists for acts of unspeak- manism's opponents. For example, l recently off. I cannot here list all of the differences able evil as well. Our constant challenge is came across a pamphlet published by a between communism and humanism, but— to understand ourselves. We know that we fundamentalist Christian firm with the out- rest assured—the two views are worlds apart. are imperfect, but we also know that we landish title, "Is Humanism Molesting Your If nothing else, humanism is opposed to alone can deal with our problems. Child?" (The answer it gives, by the way, totalitarianism of whatever stripe. Its central I think it is important that we as secular is yes—if not physically, then certainly men- tenet is respect for human freedom and for humanists make clear what our beliefs are. tally.) Therefore, while it is certainly impor- the dignity of the individual. We must do our best to prove that we are tant to proclaim what humanism is, it is A second misconception I often hear is not bogeymen. Still, our views will most equally important to state what it is not, that humanism seeks to destroy all religions probably never be popular with the masses, so that potentially harmful misconceptions and replace them with its own worldview. and there will always be those who despise can be dispelled in the minds of those who While I grant that there are some humanists us for the very fact that our views differ have a genuine interest. who may wish devoutly for such an occur- radically from their own. One of the most popular misconceptions rence, this is certainly not the aim of human- But at least we are in good company— —which, due to its inflammatory nature, is ism in general. Humanism places great em- fighting misconceptions is a time-honored potentially harmful to the movement—is the phasis on pluralism. It does not seek to battle. Socrates, way back when, was belief that secular humanism is synonymous impose its worldview on anyone, nor do its prosecuted and put to death for being with communism: "Communists are atheists, adherents wish to have any views imposed impious and for "corrupting the youth of and secular humanists are atheists, so secular upon them. We do not try to "lure" anyone Athens." One wonders if self-righteous humanists must be communists." This is from their faith, but we are forthright in Athenians of the day issued parchment about as sensible as saying: "Baptists are proclaiming our own beliefs, and we are scrolls with titles like "Is Socrates Molesting Christians, and Methodists are Christians, always eager to welcome rational thinkers. Your Child?" •

not prevent sexual activity between the races, Miscegenation and Intermarriage it made certain that the children resulting from such unions were identified as illegitimate. In the few states where such laws either Vern L. Bullough did not exist or were not enforced, individ- uals who married across racial lines found or much of American history, many any "degrading" influences, since other races themselves in jeopardy because of public F states had laws on their books against were considered to be inferior. In the southern prejudice. Many had to limit their travels since miscegenation. The word itself is derived from states, such laws were aimed at black-white hostile citizens often insulted or threatened the Latin words miscere, to mix, and genus, marriage; in the western states they seem to them and law-enforcement officials tended to a kind, group, or race. It seems obvious that have been aimed more at intermarriage harass them. It was not until after the end the purpose of anti-miscegenation laws was between whites and Orientals or American of World War II that a series of court cases to preserve the purity of the white race from Indians. Although prohibition of marriage did led to the elimination of legal prohibitions.

8 FREE INQUIRY Today only the most racist of Americans use church. These groups have denounced him Humanists and humanist-oriented indi- the term miscegenation. as a traitor to his faith. Obviously, in the viduals the world over share many of these There now is a growing concern about minds of these extremists, one cannot be a same ideas. To argue against intermarriage simply because people from different cultures intermarriage, which somehow seems to be a Greek unless one marries and raises children more polite term. This concern is based upon in the "Greek" faith. are raised with some different basic assump- the assumption that the most successful The furor over Dukakis, however, is just tions is to deny people the freedom to grow. marriages are those that take place between the tip of the iceberg, as religious groups Marriage ultimately is a very personal people who subscribe to the same belief pat- threatened by assimilation seek to preserve thing, and though I may not always under- terns and cultural values. There is consider- their identity. They are also fearful that if stand what a successfully married friend sees able validity for such assumptions, but much they allow intermarriage, church member- in his or her spouse, it is their marriage and depends upon how these belief patterns and ship will decline. Some groups even regard not mine. Humanists, by the nature of their cultural values are defined. Among those ele- people who marry outside their particular belief, have to allow individuals the freedom ments in American society that oppose inter- sect or religion as "dead." to choose a partner. Opposition to intermar- marriage—and particularly among religious When Paul Kurtz wrote an editorial (see riage seems to be a sign of the kind of paro- groups seeking to preserve a unique identity— FI, Spring 1988) that a new global ethics chialism that humanists should be trying to they are usually defined in terms of religion. could emerge by the intermingling of peo- overcome. It is also an attempt to prevent The question has recently become a poli- ples, he received a number of hostile letters the next generation from challenging the tical one because some reactionary Greek from individuals and groups. Though each assumptions of this one, and I hope we are Orthodox groups have questioned whether religious group in America has unique char- not so fearful of our own values that we Michael Dukakis is a "true Greek" since he acteristics, there are many shared assump- feel we must put up barriers to defend has married outside the Greek Orthodox tions; this is part of being an American. ourselves against this kind of change. •

his defense—people of the we're-for-the-war- but-against-the-way-it's-being-fought vari- Theological Reflections ety, those who ultimately weighted the scale of public pressure against escalation in favor of withdrawal with honor. I confess to being in a Traffic Jam thrown by that slogan as well. As a smartass undergraduate I had no trouble embracing R. Joseph Hoffmann the Augustinian interpretation: We are all guilty because Calley is guilty. But I'd wager am sitting in an overheated car in a traf- tions to the saints, and the crasser forms that that wasn't what the driver took the 1. fic jam on Transit Road in Buffalo. In of sacramentalism, such as novenas and slogan to mean. He was probably a believer the back seat, my twelve-week-old daughter rosaries—as proof of its addictive character. in corporate innocence and universal is reminding me—loudly and insistently— The more you pray, he believed, the more righteousness, the inherent Good of the that she is late for her noon feeding. We you want to pray—kneel, confess, kiss the American people. In defending that Good— have just left a toy emporium with hundreds plaster feet of statues, that sort of thing. more bumper stickers, this time Barry of dollars worth of gadgets that will entertain Religion is like a drug dependency that is Goldwater's, circa 1964, flood to mind— her and swing her so that our erstwhile shav- sanctioned by tradition and authority. It is, there is no such thing as extremity. Thus, ing, bed-making, and meal schedule can as Nietzsche said, servility made respectable. Calley is innocent because we are all resume. Just ahead of my car is a rusted Can all of that -be implied by a couple innocent. '78 Chevy bearing peeling bumper stickers of bumper stickers, courtesy of your local When my mind returns to the rear end and window decals, the least readable of Christian bookstore? Has the Jesus move- of the Chevy, now sputtering out of view, which says, "Have a Life-Altering Expe- ment, in its fervor to distinguish itself from I decide that my original exegesis must be rience. Accept Jesus Christ." what it regards to be the Unchristian Chris- faulty. Take "life-altering," for instance. A newer piece of store-bought philosophy tian Establishment, come full circle and That jack-of-all-missionaries, St. Paul, uses reads, "Get Really High: Accept the Risen joined the ranks of the godless? similar language in his letters to the Romans Lord!" I normally take such slogans as dis- As suddenly as she started, my daughter and the Corinthians when he announces that tractedly as I notice roadside beacons for stops crying. The torpor of the day and the our perishable flesh will undergo a trans- discount houses and fast-food drive- motion of the car, now easing ahead toward formation that will equip it for life with God. throughs. But the traffic glitch was long a green traffic light, have quelled her fury. An amateur philosopher who was crafty enough, the day hot enough, and my daugh- I think of a bumper sticker I saw in 1971 enough to anticipate the objections of even ter's yelps piercing enough that I found myself in Tallahassee, Florida: "If Calley Is Guilty, craftier Platonic philosophers and would-be pondering the sayings. What did they mean? Then We Are All Guilty." Who remembers— converts among the Gentiles, Paul knew that Though the driver of the car has prob- very vividly, anyway—Oliver North's proto- the most difficult and repugnant part of ably never read Marx, he seems to be agree- type, the hero of My Lai? He was a Good Christian teaching was the notion that a ing with the curmudgeonly Hegelian's state- Soldier. He was fighting for the honor of perishable body was qualified for "salva- ment that religion (read "Christianity") is an His Country. He was not a murderer; the tion." Then, as now, the word "salvation" opiate to the masses. Marx, like other young uniform and what it represented made all itself was a stumbling block, but almost intellectuals of his day, regarded the concrete the difference. Not just in the Florida back- everyone outside Christian circles agreed expressions of religion—the liturgy, devo- water but all over the land people came to that whatever else a doctrine of immortality

Fall 1988 9 might include, it could not include the idea Paul (and his audience), because he looks Christ was saved, everyone will be. that the human body—the very thing that forward to being raised and his Judaism pre- The driver of the '78 Chevy—no existen- dies—would be "saved." The Platonic phi- vents him from arguing that the physical tialist theologue he—is the heir to a long losophers and, later, Christian gnostic body (which he thinks little enough of, to tradition of muddle and gobbledygook, a teachers were sold on the idea that the body be sure) is good only for fertilizer. So as tradition rooted in Paul's philosophical con- was a kind of snakeskin to be shed—sacri- a Jew speaking mainly to Gentiles with a fusions, religious identity crisis, and the naive ficed—for the release of an immortal spark few philosophical critics within earshot, Paul fictionalizing of the gospel writers. But in (the soul of Christian theology) that was is in a pickle. He gets out of it by arguing fairness, that man, as heir to the muddle, capable of lasting forever. that the physical body undergoes trans- is a True Christian, precisely because he ac- Christianity did not invent the idea of formations until it becomes a body ready cepts the muddle for what it is. When he salvation; it merely extended it in a direction for everlasting life. Thus, Paul's chief pastes slogans on his rear windshield, they that well-educated writers like the Platonist contribution to Christian theology is that the may be poetry to those who follow him down Celsus (circa 175) found laughable. It ex- body of the believer changes, beginning at the road but they are the Gospel to him: tended it precisely because Paul, as a Jew baptism. The body that is changed—not just Jesus Christ alters lives. God zaps you. You proud of his heritage and zealous for the a part of the body, mind you, but all of change. You are saved. When you accept traditions of his people, cannot share the it—is saved. What does this changed and the Lord as the one who zaps (read "saves") Platonic contempt for the flesh as that which saved body look like? Paul probably would you, you get high; not high on drugs (the weighs the spirit down. And for him, the say that it looks like the saved body of Jesus, hallucenogenic high, because it's material, resurrection of Jesus, which he claims to since that's what the resurrection is all about. is not real) but really high. High in the air, have experienced after the fact through a If Jesus Christ wasn't saved, then nobody where God and salvation wait behind the "vision" of the risen Lord, is weighty and has been, and we may as well shut up. That clouds. unarguable nonphilosophical proof that would make a neat bumper sticker, since All in an afternoon's drive. So much bodies are raised from the dead. That pleases Paul is, of course, convinced that since Jesus theology—and so few miles to go. •

Woody Allen Interviews the Reverend Billy Graham

t would be difficult to find a more amus- "If Graham strikes a nerve he just might GRAHAM: [At first looking puzzled, ing and odd comic contrast than the convert me on camera. I'm open to it and but recovering quickly] Well, right now, with Reverend Billy Graham and the comedian I'd be glad to have a go at it with him. Sure, a lot of teenagers, it's to honor your father and movie producer Woody Allen. They are I'd love to be converted. Life, it seems to and mother. worlds apart, both philosophically and visu- me, is much easier if you're a believer. You ALLEN: That's my least favorite com- ally. Allen has described himself as "an can always come up with easy answers." mandment. I'm saving up my money as I agnostic on the verge of becoming an athe- Right before the show Allen warned get a little bit successful in show business ist" and Graham, a devout conservative Graham that he would not be getting the and when I get a little older I'm going to preacher, was at one time the personal treatment he was used to as America's put my parents in a home. Mr. Graham, favorite of former President Richard Nixon. No. 1 evangelist. This approach did not I read that you don't believe in premarital In 1967 Allen was asked to host a one- bother Graham at all. All he wanted was sex relations. Is this true? hour comedy television special for CBS. He final approval of the spot. Allen agreed to GRAHAM: It's not a matter of what I thought it would be wonderful to do a spon- that. believe, it's what the Bible teaches. The Bible taneous interview with Graham—that inter- For the interview Allen and Graham sat teaches that premarital sex relations are wrong. view was destined to become one of the great in two facing chairs at the center of the stage. ALLEN: To me that would be like driv- classics of television comedy. ing a car—you know, like getting a driver's Allen wanted it to be unrehearsed; he license without a learner's permit first. said, "What I'll do is just sit and talk. ALLEN: My next guest is a very charm- GRAHAM: Well, but you see most psy- Naturally, I'll try and make it an exciting, ing and provocative gentleman. Whether you chologists today, and most psychiatrists, I amusing spot. I don't want to get into a agree with his point of view or not ... he's think, would agree with the Bible that there boring, heavy religious discussion. I'll let the always interesting to talk to. I don't agree are very serious problems involved. God conversation go where it goes. The juxta- with him on a great many subjects. There didn't say "Thou shalt not commit immoral- position of the two of us is amusing to begin are a few we do agree on. But he's certain- ity before marriage" in order to keep you with." ly the best in the world at what he does: from having a good time or having fun. Several days before the show aired, Allen Mr. Billy Graham. [Audience applause]. Can ALLEN: Yes, He did. responded to those who thought he was har- I ask you what your favorite commandment GRAHAM: Mr. Allen, what is the worst boring a subconscious wish to be converted. is? sin you ever committed?

10 FREE INQUIRY ALLEN: One wing maybe? GRAHAM: You've got something in store for you. You see, you've experienced some these other things but you haven't experienced God yet, and that's the greatest of all experiences and I'd hate for you to miss it. ALLEN: Oh, I'd hate to miss it, if it's there. The question is .. . GRAHAM: But it's there. ALLEN: The question is—is it there? GRAHAM: You're coming to our meet- ing. You'll see. ALLEN: Yeah, I am. I know the meeting will be there, but will God show up? Gospel Fictions GRAHAM: I believe He will. Randel Helms ALLEN: But you're dressed very con- n this first study of the Gospels based on servatively. demonstrable literary theory, Helms ex- GRAHAM: Well, that was because I was amines each of these narratives in detail— their language, their sources, their similari- on [another] show earlier and ... I didn't ties and differences—and shows that their have time to change before I came over here purpose was not so much to describe the to the studio. past as to affect the future. This scholarly yet Do you think that I .. . readable work shows how the Gospels sur- ALLEN: passed the expectations of their authors, in- GRAHAM: I would have liked to have fluencing countless generations with narra- worn a very loud coat for this occasion. tive theology about a man called Jesus of ALLEN: Yeah, something casual? Devil- Nazareth. may-care? If you'll excuse the expression. 160 pages ISBN 0-87975-464-8 Cloth $21.95 ALLEN: The worst sin I ever committed? GRAHAM: [pointedly looking at Allen's I had impure thoughts about Art Linkletter. blue sport jacket] You mean something GRAHAM: Every sin is the same in wild—like a blue coat or something like God's sight. I mean, there is no such thing that—rather wild. as a worst sin. ALLEN: Yes, something really crazy like ÍUI (q¡if;f 1 at D~l~' ALLEN: Oh, really? a blue coat. Thank you for coming here and GRAHAM: If you wanted to find out doing this with me, and you're always a treat which sin was the greatest, I would choose— to talk to and I hope I haven't provoked if I were forced to choose—I would say you or alienated you in any way. idolatry, breaking the first commandment: GRAHAM: Oh, no, no. I've enjoyed it "Thou shalt have no other Gods before me." very much and I hope that we can do a repeat ALLEN: You mean that one bothers you sometime. We've had a marvelous audience the most? here and some wonderful questions, and I've GRAHAM: No, that doesn't bother me. thoroughly enjoyed it, and I want to say, That bothers the Scriptures. It bothers God. God bless you. Not by Design Because all the [time] God was teaching The Origin of the Universe Israel, all through the Old Testament, that After the interview was finished Allen Victor J. Stenger there was one God, only one, that we're to worried about whether it would be allowed ow did the universe originate? Few serve and we're to worship. to air on national television, as the censors H questions pondered by man through- ALLEN: Doesn't that seem to you to at that time were concerned with the use out the ages are so fundamental. Stenger be an egomaniacal position? of the word "God." presents a strong and confident case for the GRAHAM: On God's part? "You know, you're not even allowed to hypothesis that the universe originated because of a series of spontaneous, random ALLEN: On God's part. mention God on a show," Woody observed events, devoid of plan or design. He uses the GRAHAM: Oh, no, God is perfect. in a later interview. "It always gets bleeped laws of physics to show that the issue is a ALLEN: Yeah._ You know it's funny, out. I mean, if I say, 'Oh my God' on the scientific one, and to prove for the general when I look in the mirror in the morning, Carson show, you'll see my lips move but reader that order can and does happen every day—by chance. it's hard for me to believe that. You could you'll never hear it." 203 pages (Illustrations) probably convert me, because I'm a push- In this case not only did Allen suggest ISBN 0-87975-451.6 Cloth $22.95 over. I mean, I have no conviction in any that God was a kill-joy who won't tolerate direction and if you make it appealing sex before marriage, but he also called God enough and you promise me some sort of egomaniacal. Prometheus Books afterlife with a white robe and wings, I could Surprisingly, the special was allowed to Call toll free (800) 421-0351 go for it. air uncensored. The sad news is that it was In N.Y. State call (716) 837-2475 GRAHAM: Well, I don't promise you broadcast only that one September evening Or write to 700 East Amherst St. Buffalo, NY 14215 Add S2.25 postage Si handling for first book, $.85 for each addi- a white robe and wings but I can promise in 1967 and has for many years been known tional book ($5.00 maximum). N.Y. State residents add sales tu. you a very interesting, thrilling life. to only a few. • Fall 1988 I1 course is to recognize that other things are calling for your present attention. Carry your feelings with you as you must, but do go on with your life; do not fear intimacy. If life is to be interesting, we must sooner or later have death. Nothing could be more Coping With Grief: boring than eternal memory. Watching a goldfish in a bowl was exciting at the start, then entertaining, then comforting, and "Dear Helen Williams ..." finally dull. Life without death would eventually be like that. Just be happy for the time you spent together. It sounds as though you had a lot more from your relationship than most In the Winter 1987/88 issue, FREE INQUIRY As a widow myself of almost four years now, people have. But keep in mind that there's published a letter from Helen Williams, a I would like Helen Williams to know that still a big world waiting for you to enjoy. reader in Los Angeles who had recently she is not alone with her thoughts and ever- "discovered" humanism. present questions as to whether she might Neil Slater Mrs. Williams wrote: "My beloved hus- see her beloved husband again after her own Renton, Wash. band died unexpectedly more than a year demise. ago—nearly two now ... The one thought I also faced that dilemma. But my peace that seems to give some solace is that, maybe, and comfort come from the knowledge that when I die, I will see him again." my husband believed that what he did each This is in response to Helen Williams, who, She appealed to readers of FREE INQUIRY day of his life on earth was what counted, though rational enough to admit that the for direction in overcoming her grief and and since I also believe this I derive great dogma of Christianity is a myth, was seeking the response has been overwhelming. comfort from my memories of our marriage. escape from the finality of death. In her grief, We would like to thank those who wrote After this length of time, I still have many she hoped that she would see her recently in, and share with you excerpts from some lonely hours but I do not expect to see him deceased husband in some sort of afterlife. of the letters we received. again. I attempt to fill those lonely times Unfortunately, Helen, you have come the with worthwhile activities in support of those hard way to the crux of the matter. It was around me who need understanding, com- exactly the feelings of grief that you are passion, and true caring. Because he was the experiencing that caused people to invent As one who unexpectedly lost his wife about same way and we lived in that environment the notion of an afterlife in the first place. a year and a half ago, I may be qualified together, he would expect it of me. The sun was seen to die every night, only to respond to the appeal of Helen Williams After four more deaths in my family in to be reborn again each morning. The moon in the Winter issue. 1 see no reason why the last two years, I have come to accept did the same each month. Trees were even her humanism or my agnosticism should the fact that we are not immortal. We have better examples, living for almost a year, deny us the solace of hoping that, maybe, to face the loss of our loved ones, yet we dying, and then springing into life. Surely somehow, we will again encounter our late can find solace and peace in our secular people, who are much more excellent crea- spouses. Our science and our reason allow world. tures than trees, must also be reborn after us to describe, to predict, and in some sense, Mrs. Williams, I wish for you the very death. Wishful thinking is very strong. Peo- to understand the universe that we experi- best. ple have ignored all kinds of evidence to ence. But so far these techniques have given believe in reincarnation or a heavenly life us no answers to certain fundamental ques- Frances J. Frisch after death. tions. Moreover, science has led us to quan- Portland, Ore. However, the facts are quite conclusive. tum mechanics, which indicates that reality Personality, consciousness, and "spirit" are differs so radically from our intuitive con- all consequences of electrochemical reactions cepts of it that even the best minds among Nature has given us a tendency to seek love among neurons in the brain. When those us seem unable to form a fully coherent and support from particular other people, reactions cease, the individual dies. But a picture. In the face of such unsolved puzzles, and sometimes just when we feel secure with part of the spirit remains with each person 1 find it no more justified to deny some form another person, he or she is taken away from whose life was touched by the deceased. of survival of death than to affirm it. us. Not very many things are instinctive in Cherish the memories of your husband. On a more practical level, I would advise us, but the need for security is. We miss what You will see him again, in your memories, you, Mrs. Williams, after nearly two years we've lost. in the house you shared, in friends you both of widowhood, to find ways to divert your It isn't unusual to grieve for someone knew. But wishing for something that cannot attention from a past that is a mere memory for two years but we finally adjust. I some- be is counterproductive. You will have to and a future that is conjecture: Get out, meet times feel melancholy about people who were pick up the pieces of your life and put them people, do things. I did, and I found that near me ten, twenty, or thirty years ago, or together in a new way. Grow and live more love can come again—not "instead," but even more, but there are new people in my fully. It is not as rosy a picture as Chris- "also." life now who give me comfort and receive tianity paints, but it is the truth. comfort in return. John G. Fletcher No one is expecting you to stop feeling Frank D. Kirschner Pleasanton, Calif. love for your late husband, but the natural Alexandria, Va.

12 FREE INQUIRY I hope that I can offer you some comfort. to be immortal as a slave or with any physical senger on a friend's motorcycle when it went My husband died three years ago, so I have or mental impairments, and I would not out of control. Two years before, her hus- experienced what you are now facing. want to be immortal merely to suffer eternal band had become a quadriplegic when he Though I still miss him very much, I find punishment at the hands of a not-all-that- was in an auto accident. Brian was in his that life does get more tolerable with each benevolent supreme being. But I am not second year of medical school. He was passing month and eventually even becomes going to believe in immortality when there brought up a Catholic but has for a long enjoyable. is simply no evidence for it. time been a secular humanist, as am I. We Even though I find it impossible to be- Many years ago I experienced grief of could play the fruitless game of "If only ..." lieve that I will see my husband someday the type that Mrs. Williams is now enduring, but to what purpose? The fact remains, we in an afterlife, I hold other beliefs that are and for just a moment I thought that per- have no daughter anymore. But I'm glad to more comforting to me. More comforting, haps I would suffer less if 1 were religious. be able to help my son-in-law meet his altered perhaps, because they aren't shielded from Then I realized that religion would not help conditions of life head-on and with no re- or in contradiction to my reason. to assuage my grief. I needed that person grets. He was suicidal for about two years. My husband is still alive for me in the back now—not after I, too, had died. Then He now has a very positive outlook toward sense that he was a part of me when we it would be too late. The pain would be an eventful life, though he'll always be were together. Not in any mystical sense, dulled by that time. It did eventually all but wheelchair-bound and assisted by a live-in simply in that we shared and gave so much disappear. We are all likely to suffer grief. aide. I can't tell you all the good things that to each other. I am a different, more com- Humanists are not alone; the religionists have happened since those tragic days of the plete, and more fulfilled person because of suffer, too. early 1980s. knowing him. I felt that part of me had died Advocates of nonbelief are handicapped Will I meet my daughter again? Or my with him, and indeed it had. But much of in any competition with the various super- mother who died at 32 when I was nine years what he was will be part of me for as long stitions, from religion to spiritualism and the old? Or my two sisters who succumbed to as I live. like, because they can't promise immortality. influenza back then also? Of course not. I can't promise you that life will suddenly I find that knowing we are all, in a sense, Do yourself a favor. Forget the religious turn rosy one day. Because you and I were terminal makes me more tolerant of and nonsense you picked up somewhere and lucky enough to have known, loved, and concerned for my fellow humans. That is enjoy yourself. I'm sure this would have been "become" very special people, we now suffer why I care about Helen Williams, and I your husband's wish if he had thought you'd the bittersweet sorrow of having lost them. fervently hope that she will realize that, in be hoping to see him again. It's still a good But how lucky we were to have known them time, all the memories of her husband will life. Make the most of it. and shared what time we did. be good and warming, and, rather than I have accepted my sorrow; it will be bringing with them reminders of grief, they Albert E. Johnson my companion, softened somewhat by time, will make her feel better. Cranford, N.J. for the rest of my life. But there are other companions too: family, friends, work, per- Richard F. Stratton haps someday even another love. And when San Diego, Calif. Your appeal to readers of FREE INQUIRY I drive along our waterfront with an early touched me deeply. Thank you for your trust morning mist rising off the glassy bay, the in your fellow human beings. sun just breaking through the clouds, I think I can sincerely say that I understand your that life is still quite beautiful. In answer to your letter in FREE INQUIRY, grief and loneliness after the loss of your a bit of humor might help, along with a bit husband, having gone through this disaster Rondi J. Potter of sympathetic wisdom from experience. myself, twice. Coos Bay, Ore. A census taker called at a rural share- There are no words that can properly cropper's rude little home by the roadside console you but some comfort may come and was met by a woman with her entire when you fully realize you belong to the As an agnostic, I have read the works of brood of small children around her, some humanist movement and when you under- many nonbelievers, from Chapman Cohen well under five years old. Assuming from stand completely the quality and strength to Bertrand Russell to Isaac Asimov. I have this that there was a husband about, he asked of the honest and rational approach to life noticed that most of those who espouse his age. She said, "Oh he's daid. Bin gown that it stands for. skepticism take one of two tacks in regard fi' years now." Taken aback, the census man Then, if you can turn your sorrow into to life after death. Either they try to replace asked why she had the small children. "I something creative, constructive, and beau- it with the idea that one will achieve secular sed he's daid. I ain't!" she replied happily. tiful, you will find real comfort of your own immortality by living on through descen- This is not to make light of your real making. It may come from the world of art— dants and in the memory of friends, or they loss. But there's little point in denying your- music, painting, sculpture—or by doing postulate that immortality would not be all self the pleasures still available to you and some very useful, much-needed work. that desirable anyway. Thus Asimov writes there is certainly no assurance of any con- It may help you to join a Humanist "To life—but not forever." scious presence or awareness after death. All Friendship Center. Communicating with I agree with nearly everything Asimov any of us can know for sure is that life is people whose beliefs are similar may also has ever written, but in this instance, I must for the living, and while it is normal to miss give you new substance to fill the void. disagree with him. Not only do I want to someone desperately after he is gone, the The most important thing for you to be immortal, but I would like immortality human spirit is resilient and adaptable. Don't know right now is that you are not alone. for my family and friends. (At least most stand in the way of your own sanity. of them!) Of course I want immortality on I did not lose a spouse, but I did lose Janet Patris my own terms. That is, I would not want a daughter tragically in 1982. She was a pas- Pompano Beach, Fla.

Fall 1988 13

• The Tenth Humanist World Congress

The Tenth Humanist World Congress, held presented to Steve Allen, Betty Friedan, July 31 to August 4, 1988, and sponsored Herbert Hauptman, Mathilde Krim, Corliss by the International Humanist and Ethical Lamont, and Indumati Parikh. A special Union, was a resounding success. It stimu- International Humanist Award was given to lated considerable media attention world- Andrei Sakharov in absentia for his con- wide and attracted more than 1,200 attendees tribution to human rights. from 30 countries—far more than had been Among the important resolutions made expected. at the Congress was the decision to send Speakers included Rodrigo Carazo, pres- humanist ambassadors to countries in ident of the University of Peace and former Africa, Asia, and Latin America to aid president of Costa Rica; Jan Glastra Van existing humanist organizations and to help Loon, IHEU Commissioner for Human develop new ones in the Third World. At the third Plenary Session, in Niagara Falls, Rights; Lisa Kuhmerker, editor of Moral The goals of the Congress are enunciated 0ntario, anti-abortion protesters picket as Dr. Education Forum; Henry Morgentaler discusses his fight to legalize Lin Zixin, editor of in "A Declaration of Interdependence: A abortion in Canada. China's Science and Technology Daily; the New Global Ethics," which was adopted by poet Robert Creeley; and Victor Garadja the IHEU Congress and endorsed by mem-

and Victor Timofeyev of the Soviet Union's bers of the Academy of Humanism (see h

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Mathilde Krim speaks on AIDS and the future of humankind.

Humorist Steve Allen fields questions IHEU co-presidents Levi Fragell of Norway, Paul Kurtz,

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Corliss Lamont addresses the question Members of the Academy of Humanism hold a roundtable N0W founder Betty Friedan speaks of whether humanism is a religion. discussion. about feminism and humanism.

14 FREE INQUIRY

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U.S. and Canada postage and handling $1.50 a set, $6.00 maximum. Foreign surface mail $1.50 a set, $8.00 Total $ maximum. Foreign air mail $3.00 a set, $30.00 maximum. Please pay in U.S. funds drawn on a U.S. bank. • Videotapes VHS or BETA (please circle one) Plenary I: Building a World Community, featuring Paul Plenary V: Ethics of Global Cooperation, featuring Levi Kurtz, William Greiner, Peter Hare, Stan Lundine, Herbert Fragell, Noel Brown, Rodrigo Carazo, Indumati Parikh, Hauptman, Levi Fragell, Nettie Klein, and Rob Tielman. Victor Garadja, Svetozar Stojanovic, Eugenie Scott, Plenary II, featuring Rob Tielman, William Schulz, Betty Howard Radest, and Vern Bullough. Friedan, "Humanist Hall of Fame," Bette Chambers, and Plenary VI: Awards Banquet, featuring Paul Kurtz, Clyde Herreid. Mathilde Krim, Corliss Lamont, Roger Greeley, Tim Madi- Plenary III, featuring Henry Mongentaler, Jean-Claude gan, and Steve Allen. Pecker, James Randi, Paul Pfalzner, Don Page, Vera Freud, and Al Seckel. Plenary VII, featuring Levi Fragell, Paul Kurtz, Rob Tiel- man, Edd Doerr, Armin Rieser, Matthew Ies Spetter, Plenary IV: Building a New Ethics, featuring Rob Tielman, Lin Zixin, William Jones, John Money, Kumud Joshi, Anne-Marie Franchi, Taco de Jonge, Jan Glastra Van Loon, Sherwin Wine, Yves Galifret, Bonnie Bullough, and Gerald Vera Galanter, and Howard Radest. Larue. ❑ Tape Set 1: Plenaries I and II $27.50 $ ❑ Tape Set 4: Plenary VI $16.50 $ ❑ Tape Set 2: Plenaries III and IV $27.50 $ ❑ Entire Set of Videotapes, 7 Plenary ❑ Tape Set 3: Plenaries V and VII $27.50 $ Sessions $89.00 $ All prices include postage and handling. Please pay in U.S. funds drawn on U.S. bank. Total $ • Total $ ❑ Check enclosed

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Please complete this form and return with payment to: FREE INQUIRY • Box 5 • Buffalo, NY 14215-0005 USA • Tel.: 716-834-2921 Gallup Organization, 70% of all Americans who have an opinion say they'd be less likely On The Barricades to vote for a candidate who opposes a constitutional amendment permitting prayer in public schools. Even the electorate's non-religious voter group—tolerant, non-militant "Seculars"— "Seculars" Now Make Up have been able to put aside their differences split evenly on the issue, with 51% saying and cooperate in evangelism. 8 to 9 Percent of Population "less likely" and 49% saying "more likely." The Times Mirror Co. has developed a new typology this election year, which divides Bush on Atheism Religion in Public Schools American voters according to their "basic The following exchange took place at the values." Chicago airport between Robert Sherman An unusual coalition of fourteen educational Eight to nine percent of the population of American Atheist Press and George Bush. and religious groups recently endorsed a emerged in the polls as "Seculars." Heavily The Republican presidential nominee was pamphlet intended to launch a new push to concentrated on the east and west coasts, there to announce federal disaster relief for teach religion in the public schools. seculars are predominantly professionals Illinois. The discussion turned to the presi- The organizations believe that religion who, according to Times Mirror, "combine dential primary: can be taught objectively and, indeed, must a strong commitment to personal freedom SHERMAN: What will you do to win be taught: "Failure to understand even the [with] a very low level of [militant] anti- the votes of Americans who are atheists? basic symbols, practices, and concepts of communism." BUSH: I guess I'm pretty weak in the various religions makes much of history, When New Options newsletter asked atheist community. Faith in God is impor- literature, art, and contemporary life Ralph Whitehead, a political consultant and tant to me. unintelligible." public-service professor at the University of SHERMAN: Surely you recognize the Simple guidelines for what schools can Massachusetts, which Americans would be equal citizenship and patriotism of Amer- and cannot teach under the Constitution and most likely to support "a candidate or icans who are atheists. and Supreme Court rulings include taking organization espousing such values as ecol- BUSH: No, I don't know that atheists an academic, not devotional, approach; edu- ogy, global responsibility," and a concern should be considered as citizens, nor should cating while avoiding promotion or denigra- for the future, he responded: "The Seculars. they be considered patriots. This is one tion of any particular religion; and explain- ... It is the most well-informed group in nation under God. ing the role of religion in history and civili- the population ... these are people who SHERMAN: Do you support as a sound zation, taking a literary approach to the are interested in the very issues you are constitutional principle the separation of study of religious works, or aiming to make talking about. And they have a complex set state and church? students aware of different religions without of attitudes." He added that the Seculars are BUSH: Yes, I support the separation of implying acceptance of any one religion. probably "indifferent to religious belief but church and state. I'm just not very high on Signed by such groups as the American very open to humanistic systems." atheists.—GALA Interim Academy of Religion, the Christian Legal Society, the National Association of Evan- Evangelists Target Unchurched Religious Attack on Dukakis gelicals, the National Education Association, and the National School Boards Associa- Fifteen thousand leaders in evangelism Though scandal-mongers have come up with tion, the pamphlet does not offer suggestions gathered in Chicago in August for Congress no illicit affairs or marijuana experimenta- as to how safeguards may be engineered into '88, a National Festival of evangelism. The tion in the past of Democratic presidential such a program to prevent imbalance. four-day gathering attracted pastors, church nominee Michael Dukakis, it nonetheless leaders, and laity representing Assemblies of seems apparent that he cannot please some God, American Baptist Church, Brethren in of the people any of the time. Secularism Still Holds Sway Chief among these is James G. Jatras, Christ, Christian Church, Churches of in Uruguay Christ, Church of God, Advent Christian, a staff member of the Senate Republican Policy Committee, who is trying to sully the General Baptist, Episcopal, Evangelical When the pope's picture suddenly appeared candidate's reputation by charging that Covenant, Lutheran Church, Menonite in thousands of windows during his May Dukakis is an apostate, not in good standing Church, Progressive Baptist, Presbyterian in visit to Uruguay, many were surprised, since with the Greek Orthodox faith. Jatras also America, Presbyterian (U.S.A.), Reformed the country is known as the most secular notes that Dukakis has the gall to differ with Church in America, Catholic Church, in Latin America. "Decades of aggressive church hierarchy on the abortion issue Southern Baptist, Salvation Army, and secularization . . . [have] resulted in the (Dukakis is pro-choice) and contends fur- United Methodist. complete disappearance from public life of thermore that the Democrats' choice is in- The main goal of the congress was to every sign of Christianity," reports the sufficiently anti-communist. teach registrants how to reach the ninety Catholic newsmonthly 30 Days (April). million Americans who have no church af- The pope and Uruguayan bishops need filiation—to persuade them to receive Christ Voters Are For School Prayer not worry about the evangelical onslaught and to live as his disciples. occurring in other Latin American countries According to organizers, this was the first According to a Times Mirror survey of 2,109 reaching Uruguay, however, since only two time that churches of such divergent views Americans nationwide conducted by the percent of the population is evangelical. 16 FREE INQUIRY Supreme Court Declines to Hear was written by former New York Senator with this particular challenge, it previously received partial relief in two related lawsuits. CODESH Appeal James Buckley, joined by Judge Douglas Ginsburg, Reagan's unsuccessful nominee In one case, Kurtz v. Kennickell, CODESH The Supreme Court has declined to review for a seat on the Supreme Court. was successful in barring the Senate from the decision of a federal appeals court that In deciding that CODESH lacked stand- continuing its practice of publishing collec- rejected a challenge, brought by the Council ing to sue the congressional chaplains, the tions of the chaplain's prayers. Former for Democratic and Secular Humanism court of appeals reasoned that the chaplains Senator Charles Matthias, then chairman of (CODESH), to the exclusion of nontheists could not be sued because they were applying the Senate Rules Committee, agreed in 1986 from the opening ceremonies of the United rules not of their own making. The dissenting that it would be inappropriate for the United States Senate and House of Representatives. judge criticized the majority's standing States Government Printing Office to The Supreme Court's June 13, 1988, order decision as having no basis in federal law. publish, at taxpayer expense, the chaplain's noted that Justice Byron R. White wanted In an ironic twist, the Solicitor General sermons and prayers. to hear the case, but under Supreme Court of the United States, who represented the In another case, Kurtz v. Baker, rules lower court decisions are reviewed only Senate and House chaplains in their written CODESH alleged that the Reverend when at least four of the nine justices vote response to CODESH's request for Supreme Richard Halverson, the Senate chaplain, had to hear a case. Court review, refused to defend Judge Buck- used his position to disparage nontheists, as In September of last year, the federal ley's novel theory on standing. In a classic he had repeatedly asserted in his "prayers" court of appeals for the District of Columbia example of legal understatement, the Solici- during the daily openings of the Senate that decided, by a two-to-one vote, that tor General confessed that "we are uncertain Americans could not be moral without belief CODESH had no "standing" to challenge as to the validity of the court of appeals' in God. The judge hearing the case expressed the exclusion of nontheists from the opening reasoning on the [standing] issue." The concern over these remarks and suggested ceremonies. (The official chaplains of the Solicitor General devoted the rest of his brief he might sustain CODESH's challenge Senate and House had informed Paul Kurtz, to the argument that the activities of the unless there was corrective action by the editor of FREE INQUIRY, that neither he nor Senate and House chaplains fit "into a chaplain. Halverson then mooted the any other nontheist could open a daily special nook—a narrow space tightly sealed challenge by writing to Paul Kurtz, apol- session of the Senate or House because off from otherwise applicable first amend- ogizing for his remarks and pledging to opening remarks had to take the form of ment doctrine." refrain from similar statements in the a prayer.) The federal appeals court opinion Although CODESH was not successful future.—Ron Lindsay

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In addition, there are three secular humanist computer networks we encourage you to use: Freethinkers Network (Compuserve ID No. 75216,2000). Pro-Citadel (Tel. 818/339-4704) Secular Humanist Bulletin Board (Tel. 615.455-8623)

Fall 1988 17 Faith Without Frontiers

John M. Allegro

he divisiveness of religious loyalties has been disastrous and facing constant threats from predators. This kind of for humanity, as we know all too well. Wars fought recurrent danger needs a strong disciplinary organization based T to assert the claims to supremacy of rival theological upon a rigid dominance hierarchy and chain of command. Every systems, or even of differing ways of serving the same deity, animal must be aware of its position in society and of its have been among the most ruthless and bitter. In so individual defensive role. The leadership may normally be challenged only a matter as a man's relationship with his god it is not surprising when the dominant male can no longer command the respect that there should be great differences among the creeds and of his inferiors and thus becomes a menace to the welfare of rituals of people living in widely different environments. Such the group. This kind of hierarchical organization also has advan- variations will largely be the product of local needs and customs, tages in the process of selective breeding. The dominant male and it is in the nature of a system that seeks to establish a secures the females of his choice when they come in heat, and long continuity of relationship between a people and its deity thus maintains the strain of the species at its optimum for that religious thought is essentially conservative; innovations survival. are viewed with suspicion and, where reluctantly accepted under But in the relative security of the forests this kind of ruthless political or ecological pressures, they are seen to have roots tyranny in social relationships is unnecessary, and a more deeply set in the soil of local tradition. Thus regional and ethnic relaxed attitude prevails between group members. Thus, among variations of common religious themes assume, in the eyes of chimpanzees and gorillas dominance behavior is minimal. their adherents, an importance that tends to obscure the more Although the differing social status of young and old, inexperi- basic concepts shared with alien faiths. enced and mature, male and female, is clearly recognized, there In a rapidly shrinking world with ever-closer interdepen- are no permanent leaders of such groups, and the dominant dence of ethnic and political groups, there is no room for males exercise no exclusive rights over oestral females, as in religious intolerance. The recent interest in some form of reli- the case of monkeys and baboons. gious ecumenism is but one aspect of a growing awareness As far as social grouping is concerned, the small, highly of the need to reappraise man's common concerns and heritage. mobile gibbon comes closest among the apes to the pattern If it is too much at this stage of our intellectual development of the human family. The male gibbon accompanies a single to ask that some less emotional motivation should determine female and two or three offspring of different ages. The families our understanding of the world and of human destiny, we should maintain a strict territorial discipline, and when the male at least appreciate that our search for a god stems from a adolescents grow old enough to present a challenge to their discontent that is part of our common genetic background. father's authority, they are driven away to establish new terri- The primates are social animals. The way they associate tories of their own. and the precise relationship between group members varies Physically closer to man, the gorilla moves around more considerably among the species. But in general, monkeys and widely through less clearly demarcated territories, carrying or apes live in close proximity to others of their kind and their leading his young. But the gorilla paterfamilias is less possessive individual well-being depends upon their relations with one than the gibbon; he allows a few unrelated males to accompany another. The defensive cohesiveness of the group, for instance, his family and even to take their turn with an oestral female. is of special importance to a species living in open country Only when they make some overt attempt to usurp the father's authority does the silverback see them off. The late John M. Allegro was a philologist, archaeologist, Somewhere along the evolutionary path a radical alteration broadcaster, and lecturer who wrote several books, including in primate sexuality occurred. It became necessary for the The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Christian Myth and Physician development of permanent pair-bonding relationships for sex Heal Thyself. to become far more than a mere device for fertilizing the female; it had to be extended into a means for drawing and keeping

18 FREE INQUIRY individuals together until their offspring had at least survived to hesitate before yielding to the prompting of his instincts, their uniquely prolonged infancy. The male needed to be con- and to consider an alternative line of action. tinually attracted to his mate, not merely for the few hectic When the hominid thus responded consciously to the con- days around her period of ovulation. strictive demands of life within a close-knit family group, evolu- In looking across at these forms of family and social group- tion entered a new phase. Increasingly he learned to cooperate ing among living primates, we may recognize elements in each with his fellows for the well-being of the community, and, as reflecting the human situation. It is true that no species of he crossed the threshold of reason, his culture enabled him the larger apes adequately represents man's non-oestral pair- to control his own environment and thus his own develop- bonding arrangement for the care of the newly born, or ap- ment. Rationality began to moderate the random forces of proaches the human potential for creative thought. Neverthe- mutation in the evolutionary process. less, with care it is possible to supplement the sparse fossil and archaeological information on the social behavior of our "Regional and ethnic variations of common religious forebears by observing our primate cousins in the wild. themes assume ... an importance that tends to As far as numbers are concerned, it is reasonable to assume obscure the more basic concepts shared with alien that small groups of hominids would have stood a better chance faiths. In a rapidly shrinking world with ever-closer of survival in times of drought and widely dispersed food sup- plies than would larger populations foraging together. The interdependence of ethnic and political groups, there African hominid Australopithicus ("Southern Ape') probably is not room for religious intolerance." lived in communities of no more than twenty or thirty, grouped around home bases consisting of simple stone windbreaks. If, That the Australopithecine father did learn to live with in times of extreme heat or cold, they sought out caves or junior, and junior to behave circumspectly within the family overhanging cliffs for shelter, it would probably be only in circle, is proved by the survival of the species for hundreds the daytime, for the caves were also the lairs of more efficient of thousands of years. But the achievement was bought dearly. killers, and, until the discovery of fire, the hominids would The kind of stress involved in this primitive father-son relation- have fared better in the open. ship has been seen by some as the ultimate source of that anxiety The older males, by virtue of their superior strength and state known since Freud as the Oedipus complex. The Viennese mobility, must have provided the first line of defense and been psychologist believed that he could trace the neurotic condition individually responsible for the welfare of each family. The of some of his male patients to an overwhelming fear during prime role of the females would have been dictated by the their formative years that love for their mother would incur overriding demands of motherhood, although, in this pre- their father's retribution. hunting situation, both sexes would have been equally adept Freud's basic assumptions, his methods, and the validity at food collection, such as grubbing for roots and capturing of his patients' revelations under psychoanalysis have all been slow game. brought seriously into question in recent years. But the neurotic symptoms with which the master tried to deal are real enough, ore important for our study are the psychological conse- and it may well be that many of our modern sexual neuroses Mquences of the continuous presence within each family have their origins in this formative period in hominid psycho- group of a single dominant male, on the assumed lines of a logical development. Our ancestors were trying to move away gibbon-gorilla type of paternalism. This must have given rise from a large baboon-like pack grouping into a smaller, family- to a number of potential areas of stress between parents and based arrangement of living. The adult male had become an their young, especially between the father and his male offspring. integral part of the family circle, continually attracted sexually The infant would have found himself torn between wanting to his mate and sharing in the upbringing of their offspring. to keep close to his mother, as the prime source of food and He had to be able to assert his authority in times of danger comfort, and having to avoid provoking his father into a display but to relax his jealous aggressiveness in the interest of domestic of jealous hostility that could end by the youngster being driven harmony and the rearing of his young. Small wonder that this from the family group. All the evidence of primate behavior change in a long-established behavioral pattern at such a crucial suggests that the presence of another male within such a close- time in hominid development should have left its mark in human knit social group would have appeared to the adult to be an psychology. actual or potential threat to his authority and sexual rights. Freud suggested that his Oedipus complex was not only The Australopithecus paterfamilias is thus confronted within one of the most important sources of obsessional guilt among his family circle with what appears to be a threat to his neurotics, but that man may have acquired his general sense supremacy. If he does not immediately respond to the danger of guilt from the deep-seated trauma. He even saw it as the signals and see the intruder off, it can only be that some other, prime source of religion and morality. There is, of course, far more powerful factor is overriding his natural inclinations. Even more to religion than a sense of guilt, but certainly the sources if, at this early stage in hominid development, we should hesi- of man's "divine discontent" are as deeply embedded in the tate to ascribe such restraint to pure reason, we are justified human psyche as are our strangely ambivalent attitudes to in recognizing here the beginnings of rational self-control and parental love and human sexuality. For what religious man the dawn of an awareness of social responsibility. In the interest came eventually to think of as "conscience" is simply the faculty of the common good, the primate learned to stay his hand, that enabled his hominid ancestors to inhibit their programmed

Fall 1988 19 responses to stimuli in the interest of some longer-term ad- groups normally keep within ten miles of their home base. vantage. "Guilt" is the unease that accompanies and sometimes The early Nimrods, "mighty hunters," would eventually traverse motivates that control, and "God" is the idealist projection of hunting territories as great as those of wolves and wild dogs, the conscience in moral terms. Through his religions man both who move in packs of ten over hundreds of square miles. dramatizes the conflict and seeks its resolution. Unhappily for Such expeditions required of the hominid participant a high our peace of mind, that unease is an integral part of human degree of collaborative effort, foresight, courage, and single- nature. The spur that was necessary to drive the primate into mindedness of purpose, as well as physical agility and stamina. intelligent manhood remains with us as the energy that motivates He needed to be able to make fire to defend himself at night our conscious minds to ordered thinking. and keep warm. He needed the skill to make stone tools for skinning his prey and weapons to bring them down. Above hen man's remote ancestors developed a taste for meat all, hunting on this scale demanded the ability to think logically W to supplement their largely vegetarian diet, they set in and to communicate with his fellows, and both activities require motion a whole series of physical, psychological, and social speech. Homo erectus 360,000 years ago had fire and he had changes that crucially affected the development of Homo almost certainly developed the considerable anatomical pre- sapiens. The primate already had keen stereoscopic vision, a requisites of speech, initially made possible by the erect stance legacy of his move from the forest floor to the trees. Now that opened the valve of his pharynx. The fact that he was he would need to pit his wits and body against the animals now an accomplished hunter and had the elements of a social of the plain, fleeter of foot and already long adapted to stalking organization is evidence that he had also achieved the fine neural and ambushing prey. and muscle coordination necessary for articulate speech. Physically, man grew larger, and joined that select band Perhaps this facility above all won him eventual domination of big mammals who demand a disproportionately greater over his greatest hominid rival, Australopithecus. expanse of territory per head than is justified on grounds of Their journeys farther and farther afield in search of game individual bulk. A large animal needs more room for eating, presented man's hunting ancestors with fresh challenges and drinking, sleeping, and daytime concealment than does a smaller enriched their store of experiences. Those who were inadequate, creature. A carnivorous hunter will extend his range of or plain unlucky, perished in the open country; the successful movement to match the availability of his prey and his own returned to their mates to breed offspring more likely to prove capabilities. Small monkeys do not usually roam beyond a half- themselves "mighty men" when their turn came to leave home. mile radius of their forest feeding-grounds; baboons in troops However, longer missions in the field necessitated social of forty can range over some forty miles; gorillas in much smaller and biological adjustments, which in turn gave rise to psycho- logical stresses that would endure into modern man. Already certain physical differences between the sexes had been accen- a quarterly tuated. The male frame was better adapted to make the best devoted to the ideals of possible use of his new-found ability to run on two legs, and the wider-hipped female could not keep up with him in the secularism and freedom hunting-field. She was left behind to bear and care for her offspring, now no longer able to cling to her on the move; We invite you to subscribe the extra-uterine development required by the young hominid ❑ 1 year $20.00 demanded the mother's full-time attention in more settled condi- ❑ 2 years $35.00 tions than a hunting expedition would permit. 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If Street sexual activity had by now assumed a non-oestral continuity, and the family unit had become accepted as the customary City State Zip grouping of the species, the absence of the male partner would Outside U.S. add $6.00 for surface mail, $12.00 for airmail. have been more deeply felt than as a mere wish for sensual (U.S. funds on U.S. bank). gratification in coitus. Eroticism was already taking on its wider FREE INQUIRY, Box 5 • Buffalo, New York 14215-0005 social significance; sexual relationships were beginning to de- Tele: 716-834-2921 mand those qualities of constant comradeship and mutual comfort that we associate with human love. Call TOLL-FREE 1-800-458-1366 outside New York State. For the males, long periods away from their mates may

20 FREE INQUIRY have encouraged homosexual activity, which was more sensually emotive significance than it has in the lower animals, and com- acceptable now that automatic hormonal control of sexual be- mands more of our attention than its biological importance havior had given way to a free selection of partners. If so, would seem to warrant. this biologically sterile deviation may well have contributed Sexual frustration and deviation are the unhappy by- to the increasing dimorphism of the species. The female's need products of man's evolutionary and technical progress. While to recapture the attentions of her returned consort from his such emotional instability can give impetus to creative thought, male companions would have tended to favor those females it produces an area of discontent that family intimacy and exhibiting more pronounced secondary sex characteristics to mutual reassurance can only partly assuage and must in many compensate for the diminishing effect of periodic oestral signals. respects only exacerbate. The Oedipal stresses that modern man Among the hominids this matter of overt "sexiness" became has inherited are just one product of conflicting sexual interests a matter of crucial importance if the species was to survive, within the family. When parental ties are broken by the needs and the female responded by developing as permanent features of a hunting economy, the lonely mother must seek her comfort of her physical appearance certain areas of swelling, sensitivity, elsewhere. It has been suggested that the incest taboos that and coloration normally associated only with periods of sexual are almost universal in human societies stem from this stage anticipation. Her mammary glands expanded far beyond any in our evolution. Certainly, the avoidance of sexual relations functional necessity, perhaps to mimic those other large global between parents and their children, or between siblings, is not appendages, her buttocks, which developed before she changed instinctive, in the sense that the male baboon will instinctively her coital presentation from back to front. The swelling and spurn a female not in heat. It is rather a cultural inhibition reddening of her "lower lips," the vulva, during intercourse derived from the kind of situation prevalent in any hunting became the permanent aspect of the everted and pigmented community when the patriarchal male is absent from the family margins of her mouth. The primate female's oestral flushing for long periods. But the taboo is so deep-seated and ubiquitous signals, hitherto confined to the genital areas, extended to other that one is tempted to believe that its transmission is genetic; regions of the body as sexual display signals not confined to that is, that the guilt and abhorrence that incestuous behavior periods of "heat," and now were more permanently in view arouses in most humans must be somehow programmed into with the loss of body hair. Where hair was retained, in the our genes. armpits and around the genitals, it served to distribute the odor- Eventually such sexual customs and inhibitions acquired producing substances secreted by the apocrine glands, with a religious authority, and their observance was laid upon the which the female of our species is far more richly endowed pious conscience of the believer. But the motivations for such than the male, to advertise her sexual receptivity. In short, deep-seated, and probably pre-human, taboos must have long the exasperation of the modern "golf widow" has a long history preceded the concept of a tribal god as the custodian of his in primate development; her recourse to the beauty parlor and people's sexual discipline; and their ultimate sanction was less the plastic surgeon was foreshadowed in her hominid prede- concerned with fear of divine retribution, such as overtook cessor's anatomical adaptations to enable her to compete more the libidinous city of Sodom, than with the disruption to be effectively in the mating game. expected in a hunting community when social rivalries threaten But too much sexiness can be a bad thing. Continual recep- its cohesion. tivity in the female is an open invitation to promiscuity, which is a threat to parental pair-bonding. It must also aggravate hat unease of conscience that man developed as a means the sense of deprivation among less-favored suitors. Neighboring T of exercising control over his primary instincts is a unique young bloods have to restrain their ardour and be content to characteristic of Homo sapiens. The separation of the mind stand on the sidewalk and wolf-whistle. It hardly needs pointing into subconscious and conscious levels that is implicit in the out that the stresses in society that this new situation engendered supervisory process makes logical reasoning possible. While the persisted into the next evolutionary grade of Homo sapiens. one level freely indulges itself in receiving and recording instan- Man has found it necessary to adopt a number of measures taneous impressions from the senses, the other tries to sift and designed to dampen his instinctive responses to sexual display marshal into the straight lines of conceptual thought the signals. Among the most primitive people living in the hottest information the senses convey. If it is at this level that we climates it is often customary to wear some garment to cover organize our daily lives, it is from that rich storehouse of past the genitalia and other powerfully evocative display regions experience, individually perceived or, as some would maintain, of the body, or to adopt some cultural means of physically genetically inherited, that the religious visionary obtains his separating the sexes until they are in a position to establish glimpses of "reality"; it is his window onto heaven. By dulling permanent pair-bonding relationships and bring up children. the critical faculties of his consciousness through some form Such artificial restrictions to free sexual indulgence have of self-hypnosis, the mystic pulls aside the curtains of the sub- their price. A perpetual state of tension arises between the conscious and allows himself to be dazzled and overwhelmed natural inclinations of the sexually alert adolescent and the by the intensity of images projected from the past. demands of family and communal life. Though it was once The prophet shares with the creative artist and the schizo- a reflex action for reproductive copulation, triggered by certain phrenic his ability to dissociate mentally. Genius, as we know, visual and olfactory stimuli, sex has become an end in itself, often borders on madness, and society has shown itself willing involving a wide range of emotions, many of them in continual to extend an unusual tolerance to such gifted individuals in conflict. The sex-urge in man therefore has a wider and more recognition of the benefits their visions and voices might bring

Fall 1988 21 to the "sane" world. The manner and degree of their ecstasy mind. In that case, we might expect to find such "displacement ("standing outside oneself") varies greatly according to local activity" already indulged in by those lower primates whose cultural traditions, but all share the underlying belief that it lifestyle might otherwise lead us to think that they are similarly is possible to penetrate the limits of human awareness by spon- subject to the emotional strains of conflicting urges. taneous intuition, and thus to bypass the normal reasoning Something of the kind may be the explanation for a remark- processes. However skeptically we may treat such "instant" able ritual dance performed by chimpanzees in the rain-forests of Tanzania, which was observed by the naturalist Jane Goodall. "What religious man came eventually to think of as As the first heavy drops of an approaching rainstorm were felt, `conscience' is simply the faculty that enabled his she watched a party of chimpanzees plod up a steep grassy slope hominid ancestors to inhibit their programmed re- toward the open ridge at the top. There they paused. Then the sponses to stimuli in the interest of some longer-term storm broke, in torrents of rain and a mighty clap of thunder. As if this was the signal, one of the seven big males in the party advantage. `Guilt' is the unease that accompanies and stood upright and, as he swayed and staggered rhythmically from sometimes motivates that control, and 'God' is the foot to foot, he uttered a rising crescendo of pant-hoots. Then idealist projection of the conscience in moral terms." off he charged, flat out down the slope toward the trees he had just left. He ran some thirty yards and then, swinging round revelations, recognizing them for the most part to be no more the trunk of a small tree to break his headlong rush, he leapt than the disordered impressions of past experience, the prophet into the low branches and sat motionless. finds many ready to accept his claims to special knowledge Almost at once two other males charged after him. One and to believe that he has indeed seen the face of God and of them broke off a branch from a tree as he ran and brandished heard His Word. His "revelation" finds a response in the hearts it in the air before hurling it ahead of him. The other, as he of his followers because he is drawing ultimately upon that reached the end of his run, stood upright and rhythmically reservoir of human experience that is common to us all. And swayed the branches of a tree back and forth, before seizing because the believer can find here the comfort and reassurance a huge bough and dragging it farther down the slope. A fourth of shared understanding, he will be inspired with renewed male leapt into a tree as he charged and, almost without breaking confidence in himself and in his mission in life, and find peace his speed, tore off a large branch before continuing down the of mind amid all of life's uncertainties. slope. As the last two males called and charged down, so the The price demanded for the intellectual and spiritual benefits one who had started the whole performance climbed from his of man's divided mind is the clash of conflicting desires. Popular tree and began plodding up the slope again, the others following psychology has acquainted us all with the dangers of frustration suit. Then they repeated the whole performance with equal through the suppression of our natural inclinations, and it may vigor, watched by the females and youngsters who had climbed be that an obsession with these fears has led to the excesses into the trees at the top of the slope. of self-indulgence characteristic of some aspects of our "per- As the males charged down and plodded back up, the rain missive" society. But some frustration of our impulses can be fell harder and harder, jagged forks and brilliant flares of intellectually rewarding if the damming of the libido in one lightning lit the leaden sky, and the crashing of thunder seemed direction leads to the application of compensatory effort else- to shake the very mountains. Goodall wrote: "I could only where. Examples abound in the arts and sciences where the watch and marvel at the magnificence of those splendid attainment of exceptional skills has been bought at the cost creatures. With a display of strength and vigor such as this, of satisfactory sexual and familial relationships. primitive man himself might have challenged the elements." It seems, therefore, that in every field of human endeavor— Clearly the violence of the storm had evoked this defiant the arts, sciences, and religion—the divided mind bequeathed to response from the animals; the alternative would have been us by our evolutionary heritage has been the greatest single factor to huddle paralyzed with fear beneath some rude shelter and in our success as a species. Whether we shall survive to enjoy allow their natural anxieties to have the upper hand. Rather our triumph for long depends largely on our ability to resolve than submit to the humiliation of acknowledging the superior this inherited discontent by means other than self-destruction. For power of the elements, the chimpanzees sought refuge in a while it is one thing for the creative artist or scientist to sacrifice pattern of behavior, clearly long established and ritualistic, that his peace of mind for the sake of his genius, the emotional stress restored their self-respect. Performers and onlookers shared in for most of us cannot be directed outward to great works. It this reassuring experience and together achieved their object tends to build up within us, threatening our equanimity and the of mental equanimity. Had the animals been human beings, harmony of our social and familial relationships. we might have been tempted to assume that the intention of Some would maintain that religious faith provides that the dance was to avert the rainstorm, or to appease the god necessary relief for our inbuilt anxieties, and define this aspect of thunder. But the purpose here was clearly subjective: to of religion as a system of shared emotional, physical, and intel- seek relief for their own immediate distress. lectual experiences directed to just that end. Certainly today Human religious rituals and symbolism share a common the religious phenomenon is so universal that we must assume function in relieving stress, but their overt actions and invoca- that this inclination to dissociate periodically from more rational tions may be directed to fulfilling quite dissimilar subsidiary thought and constructive action is a kind of release-valve de- purposes, such as rain-making, inducing crop and animal fer- signed to relieve the stresses imposed upon us by the divided tility, and success in battle. We tend to regard these secon-

22 FREE INQUIRY dary motivations as primary, and anthropologists categorize given to suppressed emotions in a socially acceptable way, thus religions on that basis as nature religions, fertility cults, vener- forestalling more dangerous explosions. ation of the martial arts, and so on. But if we are to understand The psychological mechanism of the religious trance is well what makes human beings religious, we should look deeper enough known; in fact, it is essentially the same as that em- into the evolutionary origin of those psychological stresses that ployed by the therapist treating a neurotic patient. He will try, make us seek reassurance in some power outside ourselves. through hypnosis, drugs, or electric-shock treatment, to produce At least to the stage of Homo erect us we can here find common a crisis-state in his subject's nervous system that will arouse ground; thereafter it is possible that the various hominid sub- him to "abreact"; that is, to rehearse in his conscious mind species went their separate ways geographically and crossed the traumatic events that brought about his hysterical condition. the sapiens threshold independently at different times. (See my For example, a victim of shell shock can be made to relive All Manner of Men, Charles C. Thomas, Springfield, Ill., 1982.) the nightmare of the trenches that so disturbed his mind that It would be reasonable then to expect "knowing man" to express he tried to blot it from his memory. By forcing it to the light his religious impulses in a variety of ways to suit his racial of consciousness under controlled conditions, the psychiatrist characteristics and local environment. can persuade the patient to retrace that dreadful experience, step by step, horror by horror, until at last, goaded to the n a human situation, some similar tension-relieving "dis- breaking point by remorseless probing, the subject's nervous I placement activity" has been noted among the Samburu system breaks down and he suffers a complete collapse. When tribe of Northern Kenya. In this case it is a natural response he returns to normal, the patient will often express his relief to the build-up of stress in virile young men who are sexually in a flood of tears, or shaking his head and smiling, will repressed. The younger warriors of the tribe, called morans, pronounce himself wonderfully free of the burden of anxiety are obligated to live as bachelors until the age of thirty, thus that had beset him. From then on he will be able to recall experiencing prolonged adolescence. They find relief from their the events at will, so that the awful memory is not left to fester frustration in periodic lapses into a state of trance, marked in his subconscious, exerting its baneful influence on the balance by uncontrollable body-shaking. Typical trigger-situations of his mind. include the out-dancing of one group of morans by rivals, humiliating them before their women; one of their women being his treatment has produced remarkable results among led away in marriage; undergoing the rigors of the initiation Tvictims of battle neuroses in two world wars, but the ceremonies; and being replaced by a new group of younger principle involved has a much wider reference for the human men. These shaking fits may occur on parade, or when a party condition. Through such climactic orgasms of excitement, it is ambushed in the field. The trances are not regarded as is possible to relieve stresses and strains that are more persistent shameful or deserving of rebuke, but are considered quite and deep-seated than those generated by a single traumatic normal by the rest of the tribe. When the morans are eventually shock. Psychiatrists have found that it is not always necessary received into adult status and marry, the shaking-bouts cease to stir the excitement of the neurotic patient by concentrating and would thereafter be considered inappropriate to their new his attention upon the particular situation that caused the initial situation. trauma; any fear-provoking stimuli could be used to create Similarly, among the Abelam tribe of New Guinea, deprived the necessary crisis and thus clear the brain of its accumulated young bachelors sometimes dissociate mentally and run amok tension. So, over a much wider field of human experience, in bursts of uncontrolled violence, making hysterically agitated the strains that must inevitably develop in the divided mind gestures. This disruptive behavior is also tolerated by the com- of Homo sapiens can be relieved periodically by similar munity and, indeed, earns for the young men some measure emotional crises aroused in a variety of ways. of respect. Religious sentiment embraces many kinds of emotion, in- Again, the precise means of obtaining emotional relief must cluding fear, sorrow, joy, lust, and hatred, all of which can depend upon the depth of ecstatic trance demanded by indi- be carried to extremes. In the less inhibited cults, the intensity vidual needs and tribal custom. The formal worship of Anglican of excitement generated during worship can drive the devotee Christianity in an Anglo-Saxon community, for instance, into a trance or "possession." In this highly suggestible state, usually operates within very restrained and conventional limits some areas of the brain become sensitized and receptive, while compared with the less inhibited Afro-American Bible sects others may suffer strong inhibition, amounting even to paraly- of the Deep South; even the impassioned oratory of a Methodist sis. Thus, the subject may feel himself divinely inspired and revival meeting would seem to the average English churchgoer credit every random impression—whether received from a breach of good taste and an unwarranted display of emotional without or projected from his own subconscious—as a "revela- extravagance. More "primitive" peoples deliberately set out to tion" of eternal truth. He may also become inured to a level disorient their minds during their religious festivals by such of pain that would otherwise be well beyond his normal methods of mass-hypnosis as dancing to the point of exhaus- threshold of tolerance. In any case, the usual processes of the tion, monotonous repetition of words and phrases, rhythmic mind are disturbed, critical faculties suspended, and the be- drumming or stamping, and uncontrolled jerking, twirling, or liever is suddenly freed from the burden of his own individu- head-shaking. Such rituals induce a trance state in which the ality. He can resign himself to being "taken over" by the god conscious mind is opened up to the "inspiration" or suggestion or controlling spirit and thereby achieve a wonderful sense of of its subconscious levels. At the same time, free rein is also inner peace.

Fall 1988 23

It is this psychology that motivates the revivalist meeting state of extreme sensitivity, he fastens upon every word uttered and the political convention. The hell-fire speaker and the by the psychiatrist as inspired, and every wish or suggestion ranting demagogue can stir their audiences into such a state as a divine command. The evangelist and the politician may of extreme emotion that the more susceptible souls present welcome this attachment, supremely confident that their way will pass into a hypnoid condition, in which they are easily and teaching is the best and that they are themselves the servants persuaded to adopt beliefs and attitudes they would otherwise of Truth. The wise psychiatrist knows better and tries to divert reject or ignore. Such "conversions" may not be so sudden his patient's devotion into more discerning and critical attitudes. as they seem, for the stresses and anxieties that brought their The true shaman, or inspired priest, invites his audience subjects to the mission or convention may have been building to identify themselves with him in his séance, but only so that up for some time previously; it needed but the mounting excite- they may thereby share his communion with the elemental ment and the hypnotic effect of the speaker's words uttered powers in the universe. The rhythmic music and singing, and in an atmosphere of tense expectancy to trigger the release later the dancing of the shaman, gradually involve every partici- mechanism. The wave of emotion breaks, and the "convert" pant more and more in collective action. The tempo increases responds unreservedly to the call of the Master. His doubts until the audience enters a state of mass ecstasy that is scarcely and personal misgivings are swept aside, for now he is a child less intense than that of the shaman himself. Afterward those of God (or the State), his sins (or deviations) are forgiven, present can recollect various moments of the performance when and he knows the "peace which passeth all understanding." they attained the heights of psychophysiological emotion and This sense of well-being may not last long; it is likely that can recall the hallucinations of sight and hearing that they a new set of inhibitions will gather around him, encouraging experienced. They then have a deep satisfaction—much greater, fresh doubts and building up another head of emotional steam we are told, than that produced by the theatrical and musical that will need some further climactic release. performances of European culture, because in shamanizing the The increased suggestibility of a hypnoid subject is a factor audience acts and participates in the shaman's experience. that the practicing psychoanalyst watches carefully. It is too In a more secular context, much the same hysteria occurs easy for a patient repeatedly treated in this way to suffer what among teenage girls at pop festivals under the inspiration of the Freudians call a "transference situation," in which, in his their guitar-twanging, pubes-thrusting "shamans" on the stage.

From the Academy of Humanism Conference From the Free Inquiry Conference Neo- Biblical v. Fundamentalism Secular Ethics The Humanist Response The Conflict The Academy of Humanism edited by R. Joseph Hoffmann and Gerald A. Larue America's neo-fundamentalists What weight should be given to attack rational inquiry and the Scripture when facing the real moral scientific method. This threat to dilemmas of life? A distinguished NEO. reason, intelligence, and freedom is Rill' irtl I . Secular group of social philosophers, not confined to the U.S.; the danger biblical scholars, and ethicists met Et h ics FiIA[TA[ISM is world-wide. An international at the University of Richmond in group of eminent intellectuals and the fall of 1986, under the aegis of The Humanist Response scholars gathered in Oslo in 1986, the Committee for the Scientific under the auspices of the IHEU and Examination of Religion and its the Academy of Humanism, to I hi Biblical Research Project, to address examine this phenomenon. Their l'unl lil t this question. The essays in this response is represented in this important new volume are the absorbing collection of essays. Il .10,, ph I1,dlui,mi provocative result! The \eadem\ o Humam+m 200 pages andr~r:dd 1 L,irm 210 pages ISBN 0-87975-452-4 ISBN 0-87975-418-4 Cloth $22.95 Cloth $22.95 Prometheus Books 700 East Amherst St., Buffalo, N.Y. 14215 • Call toll free (800) 421-0351 • In N.Y. State call (716) 837-2475 Add $2.25 for postage and handling. N.Y. State residents add applicable sales tax.

24 FREE INQUIRY The main difference between these and more serious release- the shaman a means of access to a rich storehouse of subcon- rituals is that here the control of the participants, their initial scious impressions whose immediacy and vividness have claimed stimulation, their urging to a climax, and, most important, for them a divine origin and authority. For lesser mortals, the their gradual run-down to normality, is firmly in the hands transports of religious ecstasy in church or in the village square of the dance-leader and his acolytes; and we often have to have offered a controlled and socially acceptable outlet for sup- call in the police and the ambulance brigade. pressed emotions. The problem that has grown with man's But then, true religious release-rituals are not games or increasing self-restraint is that to avail himself of this psycho- weekend frolics; they are necessary devices by which communi- logical therapy he must relax that very faculty for rational ties try to relieve their biopsychological tensions in a way that motivation that has brought him where he is; the cause of offers the individual support and the social group a vehicle his distress is the chief obstacle to its relief. for joint action. The object of adoration is of less import, provided that he, she, or it can serve as an acceptable focus "The hell-fire speaker and the ranting demagogue for the congregation's emotions and invite some measure of can stir their audiences into such a state of extreme self-identification. The wise shaman, like the practicing emotion that the more susceptible souls present will psychiatrist, will avoid the kind of personal transference openly pass into a hypnoid condition, in which they are courted by the pop singer and the political warlord through their publicity agents. easily persuaded to adopt beliefs and attitudes they The essential feature of all effective release-rituals should would otherwise reject or ignore." be emotional relief and inner contentment that leaves the par- ticipant feeling guilt-free and relaxed. If it is otherwise, some t may be that, despite our rightly prized rationality, religion vital element is missing or, as is particularly common in over- I still offers man his best chance of survival, or at least of rationalized faiths, some unacceptably precise formulation of buying himself a little more time in which to devise a more theological concepts has hindered the complete absorption of reasoned way out of his dilemma. If he is able to do this, the conscious mind and has demanded of the intelligent wor- it must be through a faith that offers something more than shiper an intolerable sacrifice of his intellectual integrity. The a formal assent to highly speculative dogma about the nature resultant anxiety then merely adds to the burden of guilt, since of God and His divine purpose in creation; it must promise the harassed religionist seems to be faced with a choice between its adherents a living relationship that answers man's individual honesty and piety. Such "rational religions" were desperately needs within a formal structure of communal worship. It has sought among Christians of the nineteenth century to counter to satisfy the emotions without violating the believer's the influence of those new schools of biblical criticism whose intellectual integrity, and it must avoid the tragic divisiveness intent seemed to be only the discrediting of traditional interpre- of ethnic or social affiliations by finding a common reference tations by exposing the inconsistencies of Holy Writ. But no in our biological heritage. We all traveled the same evolutionary philosophy or dogmatic theology can adequately fulfill the road to manhood and so share the same deep sensibilities about function of religious absolution, however intellectually satis- such matters as the good earth, sexual and family relationships, fying. The Greeks, with their flair for compromise, managed and a due regard for the balance of nature. Racial, climatic, to combine mysticism with a healthy, rational skepticism. Their and geographical differences have imposed local variations on mockery of the traditional gods and goddesses indulging in man's responses to those fundamental perceptions, but in the amorous buffoonery in the Olympian bedchambers did not depths of his consciousness there is a common awareness of prevent intelligent Greeks from acknowledging the need of basic needs and responsibilities. Upon such conceptions it should ordinary mortals for some emotional release from the pressures be possible to found some universal and cohesive faith. of everyday living. They made their mythologies the stage on Historically, the cult of the Earth-mother, the ancient reli- which to enact religious dramas that offered them release from gion of the witches, has probably come nearest to fulfilling their frustrations, and they threw themselves into the emotional this role, and, because it is sexually oriented, it has been embrace of their mystery cults. They did not fall into the error especially concerned with this most disturbing and potential- of their more pedantic cultural successors, who demand that ly disruptive element in man's biological constitution. Perhaps biblical myths be historical fact, and prophetic oracles be some in our present concern for ecological conservation and our kind of Old Moore's Almanack. constant cry for preserving this or that species of wildlife, we Our own tormented Christian civilization is seeking some are moving toward a revival of the old nature religion and similar solution, either by rejecting the church's dogmatism in rediscovering in the terrestrial womb that gave us birth the favor of the esoteric teaching of the Eastern guru, or, more allegiance we owe our lost gods. It may be that in our growing sadly, by piously reverting to fundamentalist Christianity and appreciation of the delicate balance that must be maintained the call of the uncritical days of the Bible-thumping salvationist, if life on this planet is to survive, we can subscribe to a common and, even more ominously, to the persuasive oratory of the creed that does not mock reason, and whose intellectual "born-again" political warlord. discipline will yet allow for that periodic surrender of ourselves In summary, the stresses imposed upon Homo sapiens by into the ecstatic sensuality that is the price demanded by our the need to control his instinctive drives in the interests of evolutionary heritage. Such a faith allows for no frontiers, and social and domestic harmony can find some relief in mental can resist the war cries of religious bigots and chauvinistic dissociation. In religious terms, this has given the mystic and shamans. •

Fall 1988 25 Xi'an, and Shanghai. Although the birth rate has been sharply reduced by dramatic government-instituted measures, such as economic sanctions for families having more Perestroika and than one child, the death rate has declined because of improved nutrition and health care. And so the population relentlessly Humanism in China grows. During the next fifteen years, China's population will increase by more than 250 million, which is close to the current popu- lation of the entire United States. The Communist party and government Paul Kurtz still exert tight control over the people of China. Virtually all aspects of life are regu- visited mainland China this past spring The reemergence in recent years of para- lated by central authority and freedom is I as head of a delegation of six representa- normal belief systems in China is, in my stifled. tives of the Committee for the Scientific judgment, an expression of a new religiosity There was some enthusiasm for Maoist Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal sweeping that country. It has been accom- Communism in the early days after the de- (CSICOP). We were invited by Lin Zixin, panied by a resurgence of interest in tradi- feat of the Kuomintang, but the cultural the editor of Science and Technology Daily, tional religions, such as Christianity and revolution of 1966 to 1976 brought wide- China's leading science newspaper, to pro- Buddhism. Numerous churches and temples spread disenchantment with Marxism. vide skeptical critiques of popular para- have been restored and are regularly filled Many of the intellectuals and scientists we normal claims and of some traditional to overflowing. met had been forced to abandon their careers Chinese medical practices. I have written Like other Western visitors to China, I and were sent to the countryside to work about this trip in the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER found the country's culture fascinating: it has at menial labor. Although conditions have (Summer 1988 and Fall 1988), but in those a rich heritage going back thousands of years improved they still do not have intellectual articles I focused primarily on our prelim- and is a treasure of civilization. Present-day freedom; they cannot publish their views inary tests of paranormalists, such as China is desperately seeking to modernize without permission, and many scientists are children who allegedly possess psychic and and in this task the highest priority is given not allowed to do research. psychokinetic powers, Qigong masters who to scientific, technological, and economic Indeed, few of the people I met were claim they can heal people from a distance, development. Yet for all its industrial might willing to defend the existing totalitarian and seers who say they can diagnose illnesses and its considerable achievements, it remains state—and we spoke to hundreds of citizens, by psychic means. When we tested their in many ways a backward nation. intellectuals, and top party officials. We were claims, we found that the "psychic" children One overwhelming problem is its con- told, even by the party faithful, that "Mao who allegedly displayed clairvoyance and tinued population growth. China's popula- was a great man, but he made many mis- psychokinesis were cheating, that the tion has more than doubled since Mao seized takes." The brutal repression during and healings achieved by the Qigong masters power in 1949. It now stands at well over after the revolution liquidated millions; the could be attributed simply to the placebo one billion, though we saw no evidence of Great Leap Forward wasted resources; the effect, and that the "psychic" diagnosticians starvation and no beggars in the streets in commune system enforced in rural areas led were rarely correct. the areas we visited, which included Beijing, to widespread famine; and the use of the Red Guard to encourage egalitarian con- sciousness during the cultural revolution led to popular distaste for the Communist re- gime. This does not mean, however, that no achievements have been made under the new system, for China has made considerable progress. Since the death of Mao and the over- throw of the Gang of Four, more liberal winds have begun to blow under Deng Xiaoping. But does this mark genuine change or is it only window dressing? The abandonment of the communes six years ago and the return to small-plot farm- ing and a limited free market led to an in- crease in agricultural activity. But this has now leveled off and food production has remained stagnant for the past three years. There are some signs of prosperity, however, particularly in the coastal cities and the rich agricultural sectors—almost everyone in the In Beijing, Premier Li Peng declared that there would be further "democratization of Chinese cities we visited had a bicycle, and most society." families own television sets. But the housing

26 FREE INQUIRY shortage is chronic, and the average Chinese finds it difficult to purchase luxuries with his estimated earnings of $30 to $50 a month. Moreover, the high rate of inflation has led to restiveness throughout China. While we were in Beijing, the Seventh Political People's Congress was meeting. Some of the new policies that were enun- ciated are startling, at least in comparison with the doctrinaire pronouncements of earlier days. China is going through impor- tant changes. It is opening the door to a private sector in order to stimulate produc- tion. There are now individual entrepreneurs running their own businesses—from taxi- cabs and restaurants to small factories and farms—and many are enjoying high incomes. A kind of capitalist free market is developing. A dinner was arranged for us with Chen Weili, the daughter of Chen Yun, who is reputed to be the second most influential Communist elder in China. Chen Weili Can China make further progress without weakening the monopolistic control of the Communist party? studied business management for two years at Stanford University and is now vice- achieved within the existing structure of While we were in Beijing, Premier Li president of the China Venturetech Invest- Communist society. Peng declared that there would be further ment Corporation. The main interest of China has a huge gap to overcome if it "democratization of Chinese society" and Venturetech, she told us, is to raise private is to catch up with the other industrialized even that non-Communists would be in- capital for new enterprises; to do so the nations; the problems are enormous. It is volved in the deliberations of the govern- company offers profitable incentives to for- estimated that more than a quarter of the ment. We were surprised to see an interview eign investors. population is still illiterate or semiliterate. in the China Daily with one of the country's I wondered aloud whether these reforms Only a small elite can be said to be well- most outspoken dissidents, the astrophysicist were similar to those of Lenin's New Eco- educated. Because China has a vast pool of Fang Lizhi. According to UPI correspond- nomic Policy (NEP), which he adopted in labor, technological innovations may cause ent David Schweisberg, Fang has raised the early 1920s in order to stimulate the serious dislocations in the economy and questions in foreign publications about economy, and whether the spigot would be improved productivity may lead to high whether dialectical materialism itself is turned off in China as it was in Russia once unemployment and other serious con- scientifically tenable. And students at Beijing production accelerated. I was assured that sequences. University have recently been protesting for this would not be the case, that the Chinese We have recently heard much about the freedom of speech and other democratic people would not permit a return to Maoist massive efforts of the Soviet Union and reforms. centralization. The level of expectation is others in the Communist world toward All of these signs are encouraging. But rising and the leadership is desperate to perestroika and glasnost; even Vietnam is is the present leadership going far enough improve the living conditions of the ordinary seeking foreign investments and is encou- fast enough? Can China make further pro- person. raging some private market forces to emerge. gress without weakening the monopolistic China's Asian neighbors—Taiwan, But the chief ingredient for dynamic change control of the Communist party? Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and is absent; there is still an urgent need for Singapore—permit considerable economic genuine grass-roots political democracy. It he question is often raised: Are Com- freedom and seem to be rapidly improving should be clear that if an economy is to T munist societies humanistic? They are their standards of living, while China is still advance, the total centralized planning of secular, even atheistic; but being secular is overwhelmed by bureaucratic inefficiency. all phases of life cannot be justified. Thus no guarantee that a government is genuinely Large sections of Chinese society are still the Chinese now recognize that the energies humanistic, especially where Marxism is in a semi-feudal stage of development; one of the free market need to be tapped. But taken as official orthodoxy and dissent is highly placed party official told me that can this occur without guaranteeing a free suppressed. Communist societies, which are China needed new, creative thinking and press, a multiparty system, the legal right based on doctrines of centralized control, diversity. He complained that the ordinary of opposition, secret-ballot elections, the have not permitted real freedom of inquiry Chinese did not want to work, that the right to form voluntary associations, due and have been the enemies of freethought revolutionary slogans of the early days did process in the legal system, and scrupulous and of the free mind so essential to human- not inspire the people and something dra- respect for human rights, including the right ism. It is said that the Communists are inter- matic had to be done. It is clear that these to travel? Whether perestroika will succeed ested in long-range humanitarian goals. But workers need incentive if they are to become in the Soviet Union will depend on whether there is no guarantee that those who rule productive citizens like their counterparts in Mr. Gorbachev will be able to develop in the name of the people have the wisdom other countries; yet there seems to be little genuine democratic political institutions; to determine what is for the common good. enthusiasm or confidence that this can be similarly for China. Endowed with all the privileges and preroga-

Fall 1988 27 tives of the ruling elite, they have dominated an integral part of the world community, tion. Perhaps in time the ideological rigors all sectors of social life and do not allow they will have to recognize human rights and of the intransigent Marxist-Leninist regimes other viewpoints to emerge. extend the parameters of democracy. will mellow and a new global ethics of Will Deng in China and Gorbachev in Portugal, Spain, Brazil, Argentina, and democratic humanism can be ushered in. the Soviet Union allow the people to deter- other formerly authoritarian regimes of the Stranger things have happened in human mine their own futures by democratic ballot? Third World have begun to democratize. history. There is at least a glimmer of hope If they do, it will no doubt mean the end Hopefully the same processes will accelerate that with dedicated efforts this may indeed of the Communist system as we know it. in the heartland of Marxism-Leninism itself. occur. • Perhaps Marxism is not so much at issue Those committed to a democratic world today as Leninism, which defends central- should encourage perestroika wherever they Paul Kurtz is chairman of the Committee ized dictatorial control. can. Intellectual, scientific, and cultural for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of Pessimists deny that Communist leaders exchanges and free trade can contribute to the Paranormal and editor of FREE will ever completely relinquish their power. this development. Every effort should thus INQUIRY. But if Communist countries are to become be made to open doors for further liberaliza- Japanese Secularism: A Reexamination

Kenneth K. Inada vision is not clear enough to allow us to understand the true apan's strong and steady recovery after World War II nature of the Japanese. To limit observation to mere descriptive and her current prowess in technology and economics analysis would ultimately result in a superficial, if not distorted, have taken the world by surprise and have brought ques- view and the alleged Japanese façade would remain intact. We tions about Japanese secularism to the fore: What makes this must delve into the more philosophical aspects of the Japanese nation tick? Is secularism—as we understand it—behind her mind and spirit in order to understand the culture. phenomenal success? What are the beliefs of the Japanese people? Visitors to Japan immediately sense the dynamic pulse of The Organismic Nature of Japanese Society the nation as she hums along like a well-oiled machine. There very society is like a complex organism in that its parts is none of the pollution so common to American industrialized move together and are interrelated. Nothing is irrelevant, cities of yesteryear; Tokyo and Osaka are not only clean but E ineffective, or fruitless when seen as part of the bigger picture; novel and intriguing, characterized by quietude and resignation, every element is accounted for, however small, weak, or in- efficiency and progress, common sense and understanding, significant it may seem. This is perhaps more true of Japan aestheticism and refinement, confidence and enjoyment. Al- than of many other countries, because Japan has maintained though the mystique of the Orient is lessening as distinctions her cultural unity while cultivating the arts of her continental between the East and West blur and barriers are broken down, neighbors. some of the traits of Japan's people are difficult to grasp in Though the basic cultural heritage of Japan springs from light of the intermingling of Western high-tech and Eastern both China and India, the cradles of Asiatic civilization, Japan tradition. The Japanese mind and behavior have long drawn has refined that heritage in innovative ways to suit herself. the attention of social and political scientists, anthropologists, It is imperative that we realize the country's uniqueness and psychologists, philosophers, and various think-tank experts do not engage in piecemeal comparisons of the different phases from around the world. Their findings have furnished us with and facets of the culture. It is vital that we seek to understand important clues and relevant information, but we must usually the nation as a unified whole—yet this is easy to forget or couch our conclusions in qualifying phrases. The real problem gloss over. is that, although the windows to Japan are wide open, our The combination of Shinto, Confucianism, and Buddhism has had an immeasurable impact on Japanese culture. Shinto Kenneth K Inada is professor of Asian and comparative is indigenous to Japan, and its long association with the more philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo. philosophical and naturalistic Chinese Taoism has allowed it He has translated many Japanese works, most recently Hosaku to remain a stable religious force. Shinto maintains that divine Matsuo's The Logic of Unity, which challenges Western power, or kami, is present at every moment in every thing; methodology by introducing the Buddhist concept of emptiness therefore, attention paid to each moment, however trivial it as a basis for all discourse. may seem, will lead to the realization of the truth. Since the

28 FREE INQUIRY religion is based on the belief that the royal family was de- ficially by the Japanese people. The latter, however, would not scended from the sun goddess Amaterasu Omikami, worship heal readily, since it was deeply rooted in the organismic struc- of the emperor became an integral part of later Shinto thought. ture of Japan and the cultural and spiritual roots that reach In the last century or so, this led to Shinto involvement in beyond the surface to touch the very wellspring of Japanese nationalistic and militaristic movements, which had cast off existence. any vestige of Taoist elements in Shinto, though it is extremely One of the surprises encountered by the Allied Forces in difficult to separate pure Shinto from the strong influence of 1945, and even by soldiers in the combat zones of Asia and its Chinese neighbor. the Pacific Basin prior to surrender, was that the Japanese Confucianism is probably the single most important factor exhibited remarkable flexibility in defeat and a willingness to contributing to the molding of the Japanese mind. Confucius adapt to new situations and new points of view. For example, taught that peace, order, humanity, wisdom, courage, right- eousness, and fidelity are natural human traits to be cultivated "The combination of Shinto, Confucianism, through discipline, and that a virtuous code of behavior, in- and Buddhism has had an immeasurable im- corporating knowledge, patience, sincerity, wisdom, obedience, pact on Japanese culture.... Indeed, their and the fulfillment of obligations, can allow one to attain a state of heavenly harmony. He believed that humanity is the infrastructural nature must be taken into central force in man qua man; that is, all men are brothers. account at all times." "To be a man is to be humane" is not only a truism but a veritable challenge; no better existential expression can be found allegiance to the war effort could easily be shifted to allegiance in the world. to the peace effort, or to a neutral state of affairs from whence Buddhism is also a meditative discipline in which loving new directives would come. How astounding it must have been kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity are to the victor that the vanquished followed new directives so unified in the individual, whose nature must be pure to achieve obediently. This is difficult for Westerners to comprehend. How the ultimate goal of Buddhist enlightenment. The Buddhist can we account for this seemingly enigmatic behavior? What concept of the Bodhisattva—the enlightened being whose nature do the Japanese themselves say? is coterminous with the total nature of things—is a clear case Hideki Yukawa, Japan's first Nobel Laureate in physics, of an existential function within an organismic system. In brief, says simply, "The Japanese mentality is, in most cases, unfit Buddhism has through the years become a thoroughgoing for abstract thinking and takes interest merely in tangible things. humanistic system, as has Confucianism. By the time of the ... The abstract mode of thinking will continue to be foreign Edo Period (1603-1867), Confucianism and Buddhism were so to the Japanese."' Likewise, the Buddhist scholar Hajime intertwined that it was virtually impossible to speak of an aspect Nakamura states that there is "an absence of theoretical or of one—ethics, for example—without introducing the same systematic thinking, along with an emphasis upon an aesthetic aspect of the other. Indeed, in contemporary Japan, their and intuitive and concrete, rather than a strictly logical, orien- infrastructural nature, together with Taoist-Shinto thought, tation."2 Thus, such abstract concepts as the National Entity must be taken into account at all times. could not really take root in the Japanese mind. As we peer into the nature of Japanese behavioral patterns It seems odd indeed that the American Japanologist Robert we are struck by their complexity on the one hand and their Smith is so greatly puzzled by the Japanese lack of concern simplicity on the other. The complexity is due to the many for logical distinctions or the exclusivity of complementary alter- strains of ideology present at all times; the simplicity is due natives. In his book Japanese Society, he comments on the to the uncluttered, unified manifestation of those strains. Ac- ideas of Yukawa and Nakamura: commodation, synthesis, syncretism, and assimilation are more likely when complexity and simplicity are dual aspects of the One plausible answer is that the claim [to be disinterested in selfsame reality; the yin and yang, if you will. Westerners find logical distinctions] is only a way of saying to foreigners that they will never understand the Japanese because they think this particular paradox of Japanese culture difficult to grasp, differently. Viewed in this light, it serves as a powerful device since they see things from a different perspective. Yet to con- for explaining away misconception and misunderstanding as tinue to seek simple answers to the puzzles of Eastern thought inevitable outcomes of interaction between themselves and other is self-defeating, since to do this not only disrupts the very peoples. Alternatively, it may be only one of the many ways fabric of the society but grossly falsifies it in the process. in which the Japanese phrase their awful sense of isolation from the rest of the world, although the claim is not without Japanese Attitudes an element of perverse pride. And finally—and even to suggest the possibility is to run the risk of rousing the ire of those t goes without saying that Japan's defeat in World War who are repelled by the very thought—it is just conceivable I II was a most traumatic experience. Not only did the so- that the authors are right.; called Spirit of National Entity (kokutai) waver, but the common spiritual foundation of the people was shattered. The Smith is clearly ambivalent, indecisive, and off the mark. former recovered from the jolt with relative ease, because the His accounting and analysis are so superficial and self-serving concept had been engendered and thrust upon Japan by the that they hardly merit comment here. Though he finally admits ultranationalists and militarists, though it was supported super- (Continued on page 32)

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Antony Flew; Population Control vs. Freedom in Randel Helms. $5.00 China, Vern Bullough and Bonnie Bullough; Academic Freedom at Liberty Summer 1981, Vol. 1, no. 3 — Sex Education, Peter Scales, Thomas Szasz; Baptist College, Lynn Ridenhour; Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, Moral Education, Howard Radest; Teenage Pregnancy, Vern Bullough; The George Smith; The History of Mormonism and Church Authorities: Inter- New Book-Burners, William Ryan; The Moral Majority, Gerald Larue; view with Sterling M. McMurrin; Anti-Science: The Irrationalist Vogue of Liberalism, Edward Ericson; Scientific Creationism, Delos McKown; New the 1970s, Lewis Feuer; The End of the Galilean Cease-Fire? James Hansen; Evidence on the Shroud of Turin, Joe Nickell; Agnosticism, H. J. Blackham; Who Really Killed Goliath? Gerald Larue; Humanism in Norway: Strategies Science and Religion, George Tomashevich; Secular Humanism in Israel, for Growth, Levi Fragell. $5.00 Isaac Hasson; $5.00 Fall 1983, Vol. 3, no. 4 — The Future of Humanism, Paul Kurtz; Humanist Spring 1981, Vol. 1, no. 2 — The Secular Humanist Declaration: Pro and Self-Portraits, Brand Blanshard, Barbara Wootton, Joseph Fletcher, Sir Con, John Roche, Sidney Hook, Phyllis Schlafly, Gina Allen, Roscoe Raymond Firth, Jean-Claude Pecker; Interview with Paul MacCready; A Drummond, Lee Nisbet, Patrick Buchanan, Paul Kurtz; New England Personal Humanist Manifesto, Vern Bullough; The Enduring Humanist Puritans and the Moral Majority, George Marshall; The Pope on Sex, Vern Legacy of Greece, Marvin Perry; The Age of Unreason, Thomas Vernon; Bullough; On the Way to Mecca, Thomas Szasz; The Blasphemy Laws, Apocalypse Soon, Daniel Cohen; On the Sesquicentennial of Robert Inger- Gordon Stein; The Meaning of Life, Marvin Kohl; Does God Exist? Kai soll, Frank Smith; The Historicity of Jesus, John Priest, D. R. Oppen- Nielsen; Prophets of the Procrustean Collective, Antony Flew; The Madrid heimer, G. A. Wells. $5.00 Conference, Stephen Fenichell; Natural Aristocracy, Lee Nisbet. $5.00 Summer 1983, Vol. 3, no. 3 — Special Issue: Religion in American Politics Winter 1980/81, Vol. 1, no. 1 — Secular Humanist Declaration; Democratic Symposium. Is America a Judeo-Christian Republic? Paul Kurtz; The First Humanism, Sidney Hook; Humanism: Secular or Religious? Paul Beattie; Amendment and Religious Liberty, Lowell Weicker, Sam Ervin, Leo Pfeffer; Free Thought, Gordon Stein; The Fundamentalist Right, William Ryan; Secular Roots of the American Political System, Henry Steele Commager, The Moral Majority, Sol Gordon; The Creation/ Evolution Controversy, Daniel Boorstin, Robert Rutland, Richard Morris, Michael Novak; The H. James Birx; Moral Education, Robert Hall; Morality Without Religion, Bible in Politics, Gerald Larue, Robert Alley, James Robinson; Bibliography Marvin Kohl, Joseph Fletcher; Freedom Is Frightening, Roy Fairfield; The for Biblical Study. $5.00 Road to Freedom, Mihajlo Mihajlov. S5.00 Secular Humanist Bulletin Back Issues of the Secular Humanist Bulletin, published quarterly and free with a subscription to FREE INQUIRY, are also available. Each additional copy is $1.00, plus $.50 for postage and handling. Discounts are available on bulk orders.

FleaIis3, • Box 5 • Buffalo, New York 14215-0005 Call TOLL-FREE 1-800-458-1366 outside New York State. In New York State 716-834-2921. that it is conceivable that Yukawa and Nakamura are right, and relativistic sense, thereby guaranteeing the nature of a thing he does not pursue the matter at all. as it is in a most significant way. It seems to me that he is not able to pursue the matter, The Japanese even today find abstract thinking distasteful. which pinpoints the most potent aspect of the Japanese mind, Chie Nakane, a contemporary Japanese social anthropologist, because he cannot cast off his strict Western orientation when quotes a renowned Japanese physicist: observing the Japanese. In Smith's orientation, logic and rea- son rule supreme and prevent him from viewing the Japanese "Even when we were having a meal or enjoying a drink, the holistically. Reality, after all, is not always structured logically foreign physicist would immediately get into a discussion on physics; he would take out a pencil and piece of paper, and or rationally; in fact, it may actually be alogical. At any rate, jot down expressions. He would act as though he were possessed to reify reality or aspects of it in terms of logic is to the Japanese of something, and I found it very hard to keep up with him."6 (and to the Easterner in general) an unpardonable incursion on that reality. "Reality is thus and so," the Japanese are wont Nakane herself relates:

"The Japanese mentality is, in most cases, I can also recall a number of occasions when, before getting unfit for abstract thinking and takes interest used to living abroad, I was bothered because my foreign col- leagues would talk about matters that called for a great deal merely in tangible things.... The abstract of brainwork, even at meals or in moments of pleasant mode of thinking will continue to be foreign relaxation. On the other hand, foreign intellectuals who come to the Japanese." to Japan taste the loneliness of being left out of things because, they say, once the Japanese friends start drinking, they seem to go off to some distant spot beyond their reach.? to say, and any analysis would merely reduce it to a metaconcept. But if one should persist in analysis, then let him be cautious The "distant spot" refers to a nonlogical or nonabstract of his inherent limitations and myopic vision of things. realm that very rational minds find strange and unintelligible. The lack of abstract thinking has long been considered a Though it is not illogical or irrational, this nonabstract realm Japanese trait; this does not mean, however, that the Japanese provides the raison d'etre for the highly structured society in are incapable of thinking logically or rationally. Highly meta- which the Japanese live and which is as applicable to the family physical Buddhist texts imported from China and Korea pro- unit as it is to the multinational corporation. This realm, para- vided the Japanese with a good background in intricate analysis doxically enough, does not allow clearly marked lines or strata, and a clear understanding of reality, but it was not in the but acts as a cushion of sorts, a filler for the gaps that exist Japanese character to carry out a systematic treatment of reality in human relationships. as such. Reality simply abounded in the lives of the people Each relationship is relative to each individual, to be sure, and did not become an object of analysis. but its ultimate nature must be sought in the greater organismic A prime example of this kind of attitude and thought is structure of things. Thus there arises a natural feeling of depen- found in the Zen master Dogen (1200-1253), the paragon of dence on a larger whole. The Japanese way of life is permeated an early Japanese intellectual. Dogen "was not the sort of thinker with this group-dependent consciousness, which is expressed who developed a logically coherent system of thought. In spite quite positively in all human intercourse, from childhood to of the fact that he cherished deep philosophical ideas which adulthood. Life is thus framed within a larger realm, whether were gem-like in character, he was not inclined to elaborate it be focused on the head of the family, the president of a on the ethical thoughts he apprehended in a purely logical company, or the leader of a nation. Flexibility, respect, and system. Probably he thought that a philosophical system set obedience are necessary in human interaction and are grounded forth in the systematic way was useless or unnecessary."4 in the basic organismic nature from which their sense and vitality This distaste for systematic philosophizing is reaffirmed in flow. Individual relationships are quite keen and sensitive, and the modern period by Motoori Norinaga (1730-1801): they broaden and deepen as the dynamic interplay unfolds, In ancient times in our land, even the [Shinto] "Way" was based on the recognition that a single person is very small not talked about at all, and we had only ways leading to things compared to the vast world; indeed, one can act fully and themselves, while in foreign countries it is the custom to enter- fruitfully only to the extent that he recognizes his own status. tain and to talk about many different doctrines, about prin- Differences and deviations that may arise are quickly absorbed, ciples of things, "this way" or "that way."5 if not dissolved, as they are brought within the larger mode of existence. Even such notions as change and continuity are The Japanese believe that one should perceive things as so enmeshed in everything else that they tend to fade into the they are (arinomama). In the organismic Japanese worldview background. everything, as it is, is always in proper proportion to the total In Japanese history, the relational and organismic nature nature of things. To manipulate, perceive, analyze, or attempt of life was given great impetus in the Shinto and Buddhist to know anything as an isolated structure is to disturb its original amalgamation that occurred over a thousand years ago. The status within the grand harmony of things. That is, although intermingling of two leading religious systems is virtually the organismic nature has no absolute center of being as such, unheard of, but it did happen in Japan. The best way to in its fluidity every element belongs in it in the most holistic understand this condition fully is to introduce the larger context

32 FREE INQUIRY in which the two systems of religion reside and to which their in their daily lives. harmonious free play owes its substance and meaning. The Given this rather complex situation, it is very difficult to spirit of tolerance and compassion, for example, is basic to refer to Japanese secularism in the strictest sense. On the other both systems, and they function similarly because they stem hand, the Japanese way of life is not dominated by an over- from the same larger source, not because each system asserts powering spiritual quest. To assume that it is grossly over- its own peculiar characteristics. Without this larger whole, the simplifies and restricts the Japanese character to its "mystical nature of tolerance and compassion would never be cogent, and inscrutable" stereotype. Intuition is indeed a basic ingre- persuasive, and effective. dient of life for the Japanese, but it cannot simply be extracted It all boils down to the recognition of the momentary, from the rest of experience. Intuition requires the differentiable immediate, and relational structure that binds one's existence realm, although our understanding of it usually disregards or from beginning to end. Any deviation from this condition is negates the so-called differentiables. We often see intuition as taken by the Japanese to be a distortion that stems directly a separate and unique component in our lives, which tends to from abstracting, codifying, or otherwise separating our sensual create a host of problems. For instance, how does intuition and mental functions. function by itself or in conjunction with other factors of experi- ence? From the Eastern standpoint, intuition shows us the Japanese Secularism limitations and ultimately the disfigurement of experiential reality as such. Past philosophies, especially in the West, have paid specially since 1945, Japan has been flooded by foreign very little attention to this aspect of the perceptual nature of E elements and ideologies that have become vital to the lives mankind, since rationalism and empiricism have to a large of her people. It is to the credit of the Japanese that they have been able to adapt and incorporate these foreign elements so "Japanese secularism does not isolate tradition quickly and easily. Visitors to Tokyo and Osaka may be struck from modernization. The two aspects coexist; by their similarity to many Western cities. But this apparent Japan's technological and scientific achieve- modernity cannot be separated from Japan's age-old traditions. Japanese secularism, then, does not and can not isolate tra- ment does not make sense when abstracted dition from modernization. The two aspects coexist; Japan's from the total cultural setting." technological and scientific achievement does not make sense when abstracted from the total cultural setting. The situation extent controlled our understanding of perception. Perhaps the is complex, to be sure, but not impossible. tranquil life of the East should prompt us to reexamine our The philosopher Filmer S. C. Northrop made a distinction basic perceptual process and focus on its nature from a novel between concept by intuition and concept by postulation, which perspective. apply to Eastern and Western perspectives, respectively. The Japanese are very down to earth about day-to-day affairs Northrop's aim was to arrive at a workable comparative and are intensely interested in the present time and the immediate methodology; he did so by relating intuition to the undiffer- world. Their exemplary work ethic, their respect for others, and entiated aesthetic continuum, which is intangible and cannot their utter enjoyment of life are based on a keen understanding be observed, and postulation to the differentiated realm, which of the momentary, impermanent nature of existence. Ir, their is tangible and easily observable. view of life, then, there is no need for a creator or a god, because For the Japanese, the undifferentiable takes precedence over an almost Spinozan concept of nature presents itself at every and in some sense is the cause of the differentiable. This does turn. Many centuries ago the Japanese abandoned the strictly not, of course, mean that one is superior to the other. Far from mythical Shinto gods, though the Emperor is still symbolically it; the coexistence and interpenetration of the two cannot be taken to be their direct descendent. Shinto is now largely a denied. Northrop, unfortunately, failed to understand this im- ceremonious faith and its teachings of sincerity, purity, integrity, portant principle; thus, he could not develop his theory further and tolerance have long been a part of the Japanese character. and spoke in generalities concerning Eastern and Western A similar situation exists with respect to attitudes toward systems of thought. The Japanese, on the other hand, under- Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, the enlightened beings of Buddhism stand this principle of interpenetration and so have readily that are collectively considered to be the models mankind must incorporated modern elements with their traditional ways. emulate in its quest for perfection. The Japanese pray to these As the Japanese see it, a moment may be short-lived, but demigods but are not morally bound by their alleged decrees it is complete. For them, it would be erroneous to seek that and do not ascribe to them a divine nature or supernatural completeness in a teleology that requires a series of events to powers. Rather, Buddhists of different schools all accept belief consummate an experience. That would be a mishandling of in the common ground of existence, designated as the Buddha- reality created by the inability to come to grips with the supremely nature, which spells out in spiritual terms humankind's poten- momentary nature of life. We say rather loosely that we live tial for an enlightened existence that is available to all who for the future, but the future is meaningless without insight into have the vision to seek it. Blindness and ignorance are caused the present, and the present is cut through thoroughly by the by selfish attachment to impermanent elements, and this can mix of the differententiable and the undifferentiable. This is be corrected through self-discipline. In a metaphorical sense, a novel perspective to the Western mind. The Japanese, however, the "waiting hands" of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas are always have long lived with this perspective and have utilized it well present to actuate the Buddha-nature, which does not discrimi-

Fall 1988 33 nate against anyone regardless of his deficiencies. Buddhists directness, detachment, clarity, fullness of being, peace, and believe that we are all grounded in the Buddha-nature, and harmony can be derived from sincere devotion to these arts; therefore we may all achieve ultimate peace and tranquility. they express the organismic, aesthetic philosophy of the Japanese The Buddha-nature is the undifferentiated source of true and support the truism that life is art and art is life. humanity, a source that delineates the momentary ground of ordinary as well as enlightened existence. Since aesthetics shows us the deeper and wider organismic context around which life in Japan centers, Japanese secularism Notes is perhaps best represented by the wholehearted commitment I. Hideki Yukawa, "Modern Trend of Western Civilization and Cultural to the pursuit of cultural arts like ikebana (flower arrangement), Peculiarities in Japan," in Charles A Moore, ed., The Japanese Mind (Hono- suibokuga (India-ink painting), haiku (brief poetic expressions lulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1967), p. 56. of momentary feelings), chanoyu (a tea ceremony that disciplines 2. Hajime Nakamura, "Consciousness of the Individual and the Universal Among the Japanese," in Moore, p. 179. the mind toward quietude), and the various martial arts (clearly 3. Robert J. Smith, Japanese Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University a misnomer for the art of defense rather than offense). All are Press, 1983), pp. 111-1 12. engaged in to perfect the self, to divest the self from the one- 4. Ibid., p. 190. sided, grasping lures of the differentiable realm, and to strike 5. Ibid., p. 189. 6. Chie Nakane, Human Relations in Japan (Japan: The Ministry of a harmonious balance in the differentiated/ undifferentiated Foreign Affairs, 1972), pp. 84-85. nature of existence. Sincerity, purity, reverence, tranquility, 7. Ibid., p. 85. •

Unity and Dissension in Islam

Abdul H. Raoof

slamic countries, generally classified as developing Islamic believers hold that man is endowed with the societies, are undergoing profound political and social intellect and ability to understand his role in the community, I changes. They exhibit developmental problems similar but while he creates his own thought systems and institutions, to those in the rest of Third World, including the establishment none of these are divine. Any man-created institution may of authoritarian regimes that are intolerant of social diversity. fall outside of Islamic revelation, but not outside the power But developmental theories alone do not sufficiently of God. explain the absence of political and religious freedom in According to traditional theology, Islam, through the Islamic countries or the fact that the concepts of free thought revelations of the Prophet Mohammed, guides man toward and religious skepticism are alien to Islamic society. A brief unity with the universe and helps him achieve the salvation historical perspective may provide insight into contemporary of his soul. Thus, Islam is considered a divine guide for the conditions. discovery of "truth," a truth that can be discovered only Islam distinguishes between the religious and the secular. through the revelations of the prophets, especially the It is both a way of life and a system of belief, a set of behavioral revelations of Mohammed, "the Seal of the Prophets." The and religious beliefs and prescriptions that extend to social, divinely revealed law, mediated by the Prophet, contains political, economic, and personal conduct. And despite early universal and indivisible truth. Human laws, devised by historic periods in which opportunities for more freedom of reason, are mainly the function of the philosophers and serve inquiry emerged and social developments challenged Islamic as applications of divine revelation. political and religious unity, the institutions that safeguarded "Truth" is revealed in the Qur'an, the Islamic holy book, the Islamic tradition continued to shape the behavior of in- and the Sunna, which is based on the teachings and practices dividuals and condition their societies for many centuries. of Mohammed. These two books are the sources of Shari'a, the governing law of Islamic society. According to Islamic Abdul H. Raoof is professor of political science at the State tradition, these books are sacred and cannot be modified. University College at Buffalo and specializes in Middle East Since Islam does not differentiate between polity and politics. He has written extensively on the politics of Iraq, religion, it emphasizes the formation and continuation of the Saudi Arabia, and the Persian Gulf, and is currently at work Umma, a community of believers who accept the revelations on a book about the Iraqi-Iranian war. of the Prophet Mohammed. The Umma is not a nation bound by physical and psychological attributes and cultural affinities;

34 FREE INQUIRY rather, it is a multi-racial, multi-ethnic community united by menting the law by safeguarding the believers of the community; belief. The Umma is a "living reality" transcending family, that is, he was charged with enforcing obedience to the law clan, and tribe in a larger community of those who share and with the maintenance of pure Islam. The Caliph was to a common belief—belief in Islam.' protect the faithful and defend them against heretics and un- From its inception, the concept of the Umma was essential believers. It was his religious duty to protect the Umma and to the development of Islamic society. A distinctly Arabic shield it from the threat of disunity, strife, and heresy. institution determined by the Shari'a, the Umma was Muslims owed obedience to the Caliph only inasmuch as completely implemented early on in Islamic civilization. It he was instrumental in applying this law. At least in theory, tried to unite rival Arab tribes and commit them to the the power of the Caliph was conditional upon his faithful common goal of revealed religion. As Islam spread, the Umma encompassed non-Arab territories and expanded to absorb "Religious freedom seems to have dipped to other racial and ethnic groups. its lowest levels when Islamic society lost its zeal for intellectual inquiry. Islam's traditions Freedom Within the Umma have been carefully structured to prohibit he Umma—and the role of the Caliph within the Umma— deviation in the form of inquiry." T is central to the Islamic notion of freedom. In Muslim society, freedom means the right of an individual to strive for discharge of his duty to guard the law and its application achievement of a pure existence. This freedom "to exist purely" throughout the Umma.3 The Caliph wielded fairly unrestricted cannot be reached without willingness to submit oneself to the political control over the religious community because he was will of Allah, who alone possesses pure freedom. There is no expected to guard the Shari'a and to uphold the faith of the other kind of freedom possible. To rebel against the Infinite community. Ibn Taymiya, the thirteenth-century jurist, wrote, Principle in the name of freedom is to become enslaved to "The exercise of authority is a religious function and a good the world. Man is not expected to act freely, for such an action work which brings (one) near to God, and drawing near to impairs the quality of his existence and threatens the unity God means obeying God and his Prophet."4 Similarly, members of the Umma. of the community were expected to observe and maintain In the Islamic worldview the ideal state is a theocracy. Ibn behavior compatible with the prescriptions of the Shari'a. The Khaldun (1332-1406), the Muslim philosopher best known to authority of the Caliph, based as it was on Islamic law, was the West, observing the Islamic community of his time, ad- converted into an effective power to repress any religious vanced a theory of government in his Muqaddim. Khaldun movement challenging it. Even at the time of the declining distinguished three kinds of state according to their govern- Islamic state, the Caliph never abrogated the Shari'a, although ments and purposes: Siyasa Diniya, government based on the he might at times have set it aside. divinely revealed law, the ideal Islamic theocracy; Siyasa Aqliya, In reality, the protectors of the faith were the Ulama, the government based on a law established by human reason; and religious leaders, who monitored the actions of the ruler. In Siyasa Madaniya, government of the ideal state established by order to minimize conflict and tensions within society, the ruler the philosophers. delegated the functions of interpretation, even legislation, to Although Khaldun stands out as an independent political the Ulama. Obviously, the religious establishment would not thinker, his orientation was firmly Islamic. He surveyed the tolerate interpretation or legislation which would be in conflict political scene dispassionately, never losing sight of the original with the Shari'a, and despite the ruthlessness of some rulers, ideal Muslim state, a state that he claimed existed only during they did not dare transgress the Law. Thus, Islam's religious the reign of the Four Caliphs who immediately succeeded the tradition and law continued to be the base of political authority Prophet Mohammed. on which rulers justified their power. But even before Ibn Khaldun, another writer, al-Mawardi Coexistence between political authority and religious (991-1031), believed that the Caliphate was in decline and that authority was commensurate with intellectual advancement. As the Islamic community was therefore no longer functioning a result of enlightenment of both rulers and the Ulama, science as expected under the divine law. According to al-Mawardi, flourished and freedom of thought emerged during the Islamic the Caliph's authority was derived from the Umma and Golden Age (before the Ottoman Empire of the fifteenth to expressed by consensus. This relationship, he emphasized, was nineteenth centuries), particularly in the Abbsides reign. Dif- a form of contract between the Umma and the Caliph, and ferent interpretations of the Shari'a even emerged, though these if it was violated by the ruler, or if he failed to discharge his interpretations were rarely tolerated by religious leaders or duty in accordance with the faith, he should be replaced. rulers. The duties of the Caliph, al-Mawardi stated, are clearly Political and economic disasters, which plagued the Islamic expressions of "the unity of the religion and politics, of the community after the eleventh century, put an end to most spiritual and temporal, or religious and secular aspect of a intellectual activity. Popular religious movements for the most life centered in and leading to God."2 part denied human freedom, as they were closely connected The Caliph, as head of the Islamic community, presided with the development of Islamic asceticism and mysticism. The over his society as "commander of the faithful." As vice-regent most popular of these movements was Sufism, which empha- to the Prophet he was defender of faith, charged with imple- sizes that ultimate happiness is the unification of the self with

Fall 1988 35 the Absolute and the Infinite, which are beyond limitation and called the Mufti, to interpret the Shari'a for the new political- are absolutely free. The Sufis believe that happiness can be religious community. The Mufti, as a chief interpreter of the achieved only by denying the things of this earth and turning Shari'a, often become subservient to the political whims of the the soul to the divine. Thus, man should strive to achieve the Sultan. (Freedom from arbitrarily exercised power by the Sultan absorption of his personality into the one real divine existence. is still viewed as inconsistent with Islam). Religious freedom seems to have dipped to its lowest levels In the eighteenth century and afterward, political power when Islamic society lost its zeal for intellectual inquiry. During came to dominate Islam, and freedom became a political issue the Ottoman Empire Islamic civilization declined, its spiritual rather than a religious one. At the same time the strength of vitality waned, and political influence prevailed. Both spiritual Islam was challenged by Western imperial powers and Wes- tern secular ideas. "Freedom 'to exist purely' cannot be reached Confronted with the ideas and pervasive power of the West, without willingness to submit oneself to the Islamic society reacted defensively. The Sultan, in order to will of Allah.... Man is not expected to protect his power, embarked upon the westernization of both the bureaucracy and the army. At the same time, religious act freely, for such an action impairs the leaders blamed the political weakness of Islam on loss of belief quality of his existence." and corrupt practices. One movement, the Whabi, advocated a puritanical Islam, which would rid the society of all the divisive and political dissent were conspicuously absent. The Ulama factors of urban life. Another reform movement in the nine- were removed from their traditional function of guarding the teenth century, led by Jamal al-Din and Mohammed Abduh, Shari'a, while the Ottoman rulers subordinated the Ulama to focused on an appeal for purification of Islamic belief and political and military activities. The Shari'a was supposed to practice. This movement proposed reinstatement of Islamic supersede canon law, but the canon law, comprised of the principles in the light of the contemporary situation and sought political and administrative ordinances of the Sultan, was often to remove the causes of division between Muslims, uniting them used to advance his political power. in defense of the Faith. The most striking development in Islamic society at this Despite the challenge of western secularization, and despite time was the dissociation of political and religious authority. eras such as the Ottoman, the Umma and the Shari'a have Without abrogating his religious authority, the Sultan came remained uppermost in Islamic society. to acquire the power to select from among the Ulama a leader, The concept of freedom and of free thinking thus has always been different in Islamic society; in Western secular society, freedom is understood in terms of an individual's possession of rights and a government's possession of the political authority Help Further the Cause to foster the development of these rights. This assumes certain of Humanism. limitations of the government's authority. Please remember FREE INQUIRY in your will. Freedom, as defined within the context of Islamic Divine Won't you consider making a provision in your will Law, concerns not only a relationship with God but also one's for FREE INQUIRY and the Council for Democratic and relationship with nature, with one's fellows, and with oneself. Secular Humanism? This will ensure vital support Muslims are not free to do whatever they wish with their lives. for the defense and development of humanism. The Shari'a imposes limitations on activities of daily living in Although humanists do not believe in immortal- order to facilitate attainment of unity. ity, they know that the good work they do will sur- Because socio-political religious unity is the essential appeal vive them. By leaving a percentage of your estate to of Islam, its traditions have been carefully structured to prohibit FREE INQUIRY (CODESH, INC.), you will be furthering the ideals of humanism. deviation in the form of free inquiry. Islamic society does tolerate We would be happy to work with you and your deviation in non-Muslim groups that are allowed to exist within attorney in the development of a will or estate plan its physical boundaries, but it does not extend this tolerance that meets your wishes. to practicing Muslims. Islamic socio-religious concepts reinforce Besides a will, there are many other possibilities, an intolerance for social diversity. Religious, legal, and such as living trusts and charitable gift annuities intellectual institutions are carefully structured to facilitate from which you receive an annual income from the transfer of property now. Or you might make a con- freedom through conformity to the will of Allah, the only true tingent bequest, by which FREE INQUIRY (CODESH, freedom recognized by Islam. INC.) will receive a gift only if your primary bene- ficiaries do not survive you. Notes For more information, contact Paul Kurtz, Editor of FREE INQUIRY. I. E. I. J. Rosenthal, Political Thoughts in Medieval Islam (London: P.O. Box 5 • Central Park Station Cambridge University Press, 1962), p. 25. Buffalo, New York 14215. 716-834-2921 2. Rosenthal, p. 35. All inquiries will be held in the strictest confidence. 3. Rosenthal, p. 8. 4. Quoted in Rosenthal, p. 35. 5. A. R. Gibb, Mohammedanism, 2nd Ed. (New York: Galaxy Books, 1962), pp. 127-164. •

36 FREE INQUIRY Christian Soldiers March on Latin America

Merrill Collett

he Spanish conquest of Latin America was both a reli- New Protestant preachers spring from the ranks of these gious and a political mission. King Ferdinand and converts, while the number of Catholic priests declines. In some T Queen Isabella—Spain's "Catholic Monarchs"—set out parishes there is only one priest for as many as 10,000 par- to evangelize, as well as colonize, the New World. After the ishioners. Not only has the Vatican lost its religious monopoly conquistadors conquered the Indians, the clerics converted them in Latin America, but there is fear that Catholicism could in mass baptisms that made a whole continent Catholic in less become a minority religion. "The springtime of the sects could than a century. also be the winter of the Catholic Church," warned the Brazilian Four centuries after the consolidation of the Spanish Ameri- archbishop Lucas Moreira Neves. can empire, a new wave of Christian soldiers is rolling over Protestantism reached the Latin American mainland in the the region. Supplied with money and materiel from the United 1700s, when British planters migrated from the western Carib- States Bible Belt and armed with the latest merchandising and bean islands to the Atlantic Coast of the Central American media techniques, evangelical Christians are taking Latin isthmus. They were followed by English-speaking missionaries America by storm. One-third of the world's Protestant mis- of the Moravian Church, a German-Czech spinoff of the Refor- sionaries are now deployed over the southern half of this mation. The Moravian missionaries settled among the coastal hemisphere. Faith-healing, Bible-thumping preachers fill soccer Indians and remained isolated from the Spanish-speaking peo- stadiums from Santiago to San Salvador. ples of the rest of the region. The Catholic hierarchy didn't Like the Catholic priests of imperial Spain, the evangelical face a real challenge to its hegemony until the independence missionaries combine Christian duty with defense of empire. movement erupted in the early nineteenth century. These were the twin purposes of the "gospel invasion" of Jamaica Only a few Catholic clergy embraced the cause of indepen- (July 8 to 19) announced in 1987 by United States evangelist dence. The rest allied themselves with local landed oligarchs Lowell Lundstrom. Lundstrom rallied his troops with the threat against the rebels, and this proved to be a very costly alliance that "ours could be the last major Christian offensive in Jamaica" for the clergy. After the independence armies defeated Spain, if approaching elections threw out the conservative government their leaders turned on the church. They expropriated church of Edward Seaga, Ronald Reagan's closest ally in the Caribbean. property, imposed secular government, abolished ecclesiastical Lundstrom warned in a fund-raising letter that Seaga's "pro- courts, and invited United States Protestants to send mission- Christian and pro-U.S." political party was losing popularity aries. to the "strongly socialistic" opposition party. The mainline denominations weren't quick to respond. Lundstrom's gospel invaders never hit the beach at Montego Methodist, Presbyterian, and Baptist missionaries preferred to Bay. They were blown out of the water by the shocked reaction preach to the "heathens" of Africa and Asia than to the Catho- in Jamaica to the sharply partisan tone of his fund-raising letter, lics of Latin America, who were already at least nominally which made it clear that Lundstrom was more interested in Christians. But new fundamentalist sects were rising out of saving Seaga's pro-Reagan government than in saving souls. America's nineteenth-century religious revival, and they were Although this battalion of Christian soldiers was forced back full of religious fervor. They set out to convert everyone, to the barracks, the evangelical army continues to advance. especially those in the grip of "Romanism." Writing from There were only 50,000 Protestants in Latin America at Guatemala, pioneer evangelical missionary Cyrus Scofield urged the turn of the century. Today there are at least 30 million, a greater effort to challenge the "utterly debased and idolatrous" and that number is increasing at the rate of 15 percent a year, Latin American Catholic church.' according to a 1986 Catholic church report. Four hundred Latin American Catholics convert every hour, 3.5 million every year. he results of those early efforts could be seen one hundred T years later, in November 1982, when Protestant funda- Merrill Collett is an award-winning investigative journalists mentalists held a rally in Guatemala City to celebrate their who reports on Latin America for the Washington Post and Central American centennial. The turnout was truly impressive. other newspapers and magazines. He lives in Venezuela and Over half a million people came to hear Argentinian evangelist has studied American affairs at Stanford University, Johns Luis Palau extol Guatemala's military dictator, a born-again Hopkins University, and Cornell University. general named Efrain Rios Montt. Rios Montt had taken power the previous March, claiming divine guidance. "I have con-

Fall 1988 37 fidence in my God, my master and my king, that He will guide they withdrew from the political arena. Now they have returned me, because only He can grant or take away power," the general with reinforcements. A determined Christian Right is out to told a national television audience on the night of his coup.3 organize America's 60 million conservative Christians into a Rios Montt had been converted by a tiny northern Cali- powerful voting bloc united around laissez-faire capitalism at fornia sect that arrived in Guatemala after the 1976 earthquake. home and militant anti-communism abroad. The sect was called Gospel Outreach, and it saw the earthquake Evangelical foreign policy derives from a formula that as a chance to preach the word while passing out relief supplies. equates true religion with America itself. Literally applying the The word was that God had ordered the earthquake to shake language of the New Testament, fundamentalists identify the Guatemala out of sin. Guatemalans listened closely. Living in United States as "new Israel" and see themselves as the new a war-torn, impoverished country where diarrhea is a leading chosen people. It follows that the enemies of America are the cause of death and the daily caloric intake is lower than any- enemies of God. "Godless communism" is the greatest enemy where else in the hemisphere except Haiti, they could easily of all. Communism not only combines atheism and anti- believe they were part of a larger plan of punishment. The Americanism, but holds as its fundamental principle the En- lightenment notion that humans can be perfected—an outright "It is the poor who are flocking to fundamentalists. heresy. Thus communism is anathema; communist states are Trapped in misery, they look for escape through faith- part of an "evil empire"; and communist guerrillas are the earthly fealing, speaking in tongues, ecstatic religious expe- agents of the devil. riences, self-flagellation, or just uniting in prayer with There were communist guerrillas in Guatemala when Rios Montt took over. Guatemala was nearing a quarter-century fellow believers." of insurgency that began after the CIA overthrew a legitimately elected, reform-minded government in 1954. Every Guatemalan message that the next world was better than this one was very government thereafter required military approval. But although good news indeed. the top brass ran the country, they couldn't seem to eliminate In Guatemala, and in the rest of Latin America, the evan- the insurgents. Then came Rios Montt. With church elders gelical movement extends into all social classes, but it is the at his elbow as government advisors, he ordered out the army poor who are flocking to the fundamentalists. Trapped in in what amounted to a holy war against the Red Menace. misery, they look for escape through faith-healing, speaking He called it "a policy of scorched communists." in tongues, ecstatic religious experiences, self-flagellation, or But thousands of Indian villagers, not leftist insurgents, just uniting in prayer with fellow believers. The number of turned up dead. Government aide Francisco Bianchi—admini- potential converts is enormous. There are 60 million people strator of the Gospel Outreach church in Gautemala City— in the region living precariously from one day of poverty to explained this to an investigator from the U.S. human rights the next. The Christian Right that took root in the American group Americas Watch. "The guerrillas won over many Indian Bible Belt is spreading its seeds over fertile soil south of the collaborators," Bianchi said. "Therefore the Indians were sub- border. versives, right? And how did you fight subversion? Clearly you In 1976, the year of the earthquake, the number of evan- had to kill Indians because they were collaborating with sub- gelicals in Guatemala rose by 14 percent. The number jumped version."5 again in 1982, when Rios Montt staged his coup. For the first The slaughter was "systematic and cold-blooded," Americas time, a Protestant fundamentalist had become a Latin American Watch reported. The Guatemalan bishops' conference warned chief of state. The missionaries were delighted. Florida preacher that "never in our history have such extremes been reached, Hap Brooks told a United States interviewer that the coup with the assassinations now falling into the category of geno- was "the greatest miracle of the twentieth century, formed in cide."6 Among those slain were several activist Catholic priests heaven before it was formed on earth."4 and hundreds of catechists. But the Rios Montt regime wasn't The policies of the seventeen-month-long Rios Montt regime the first to attack progressives in the Guatemalan Catholic reveal much about the political agenda of the evangelical move- church. Several military governments earlier, the armed forces ment. By following the logic embedded in Protestant funda- had decided to crack down on clergy who rallied the people mentalism, the general arrived at a program of systematic against right-wing death squads and "social sin." murder. In Guatemala, as in the rest of Latin America, the Roman U.S. fundamentalists were slow to commit themselves to Catholic church was no longer a solid pillar of old social order. political action. The nineteenth-century revivalists believed the A revolution had occurred in the church, and there were many world could be saved by God, not reformed by humankind. Catholics who wanted the church to make a revolution. Latin They broke sharply with the social gospel of the period, which American bishops meeting in Medellin, Colombia, in 1968 had encouraged Christians to work for women's suffrage and the set the tone for the more militant mood. The bishops agreed abolition of slavery. The new sects considered politics a dan- that Christ came to free humankind from earthly injustice as gerous diversion from the urgent task of preparing for Christ's well as from sin. The new concept was called "liberation imminent second coming. Politics was potentially damaging theology," and it had a built-in action component. No more to the movement. That view was confirmed after their vociferous pie-in-the-sky-when-you-die. The church had to make the king- involvement in the Scopes trial of the 1920s branded funda- dom come here and now. mentalists as backward yokels. Bruised by the bad publicity, A small number of priests joined the guerrillas, but most

38 FREE INQUIRY of those who picked up the banner of liberation theology did Jesus. Pat Robertson reached into the deep pockets of his U.S. so in peace. Their weapon was not the gun, but the comunidad contributors to put Christian Broadcasting Network offices in de base—a "base community" of Catholics who shared religion three Latin American countries. Jimmy Swaggart toured the and social action. Typical projects were farmers' cooperatives region last year in his private jet, booming out the message and the construction of sewer systems and water-supply systems. that "America loves you" on a state-of-the-art 160,000-watt These grass-roots efforts weren't "political" in the conventional sound system. sense, but their political implications were enormous. Thou- Swaggart arrived in Chile in January 1987 to hold a three- sands of small groups were challenging the centuries-old as- day religious revival with strong political overtones. He set up sumption that poverty and misery were God-ordained. For the shop in Santiago's National Stadium, which was used as a first time since Spain colonized Latin America with a cross torture center and concentration camp after General Augusto and a sword, Christianity had become the inspiration for revolt. Pinochet overthrew a democratically elected government in 1973. That didn't trouble the televangelist. Swaggart called s Catholic clergy abandoned the defense of the power Pinochet's coup "one of the great events of the century." During A structure, U.S. fundamentalists marched into the breach. one revival meeting Swaggart prayed: "Father, pour out a revival The way was opened by profound social changes. Today's Latin on Chile, because despite what the U.S. press has said about America is more urbanized, more saturated with electronic this country, here there is freedom of worship.... I give thanks media, more industrialized, more populated, better educated, to God for the freedom enjoyed in Chile."7 Among those and far more complex than the old stereotypes suggest. Ex- freedoms was the right to watch Swaggart preach every Sunday tended families, large landholders, military caudillos, and the in perfectly dubbed Spanish on government-controlled tele- traditional Roman Catholic hierarchy no longer define what vision. is right and wrong. People have lots of questions, and the evan- Some 10 percent of Chile's population of 12 million are gelicals have lots of answers. now evangelicals, and many thousands of them live in shanty They also have lots of money. The economic growth of towns that have sprung up on the edge of Santiago. Chile, the Bible Belt states has elevated the earnings of conservative like other Latin American countries, has been rapidly urbanized. Christians. Some of them are now fabulously wealthy. Texas Venezuela set the pace for this regional trend. Campesinos billionaire Nelson Bunker Hunt kicked in $15 million and abandoned the countryside in record numbers after Venezuela's rounded up another $20 million from his friends to fund the oil earnings brought sudden wealth to the cities. In two genera- Campus Crusade's Central American campaign and a film on tions Venezuela changed from being 20 percent to 80 percent

Fall 1988 39 urban. This rural-to-urban shift favors the evangelicals. "Man into warring religious cliques that divide food co-ops, trade looks more to himself in the city. He wants his own personal unions, neighborhoods, and even families. "The evangelicals religion,"8 said Luis Magin Alvarez, executive secretary of the are doing the most damage to our efforts right now," Bishop Venezuelan Evangelical Council. Magin said evangelicals flour- Victor Corral told me during a visit to Ecuador's province of ish in Venezuela's villas miserias, where the Protestant Chimborazo. "They divide us; they create islands." proselytizers build crude templos and set up support networks Spread out under the snow-covered volcano for which the for people who are cut off from their rural roots. "The templos province is named, peaceful Chimborazo hardly looks like a are like neighborhood social centers," said Magin. "You can battleground, but that's what it became when its former bishop, go there for a new and fresh message of hope or just to get Leonidas Proano, took steps to empower the Indian poor. Born away from the noise at home." into a humble family, Proano was one of the pioneers in the The number of Venezuelan evangelicals has tripled in the movement to involve the Catholic church in social reform. Soon after he took charge of the diocese in 1954, Proano gave 950 "The policies of the seventeen-month-long Rios acres of church property to Indian families for an agricultural Montt regime reveal much about the political agenda cooperative. Local landowners fell into a frenzy. They alerted of the evangelical movement. By following the logic the government to the danger of a "red" bishop trying to incite the "backward" Indians. embedded in Protestant fundamentalism, the general Proano was briefly jailed in 1976, but despite constant har- arrived at a program of systematic murder." assment by Ecuador's elite he spent thirty years fighting for the dignity of the Indians. He moved the church out of its past 20 years to 1.5 million, or 12 percent of the population. gilded cathedrals and into remote villages, where he built dozens Some members of the movement hope to make political capital of Indian base communities that could provide for themselves out of this rapid expansion. They have founded an evangelical materially and spiritually. By the time he retired in 1985, political party that is running its own born-again candidate Proano's efforts had earned him a nomination for the Nobel in this year's presidential race. The party's acronym is ORA, Peace Prize. Now Proano's work is under siege. The evan- which means "pray" in Spanish. ORA's candidate proposes gelicals have targeted Chimborazo, and they openly attack the to reorganize Venezuela on the "biblical" principles of "free Catholic church there. "Monsignor Proano's greatest success enterprise and free elections." was making the church credible to the Indians," says Bishop Although urbanization increases the appeal of the evan- Corral. "Now the evangelicals go around with loudspeakers gelicals, the movement is not limited to Latin American cities. trying to destroy our credibility and our community work. The Fundamentalist missionaries are active in the countryside as powerful landowners are gone, but the goal is the same—to well. They gain entrée to villages by offering social services, disunite the people.""° such as medical clinics and schools, not provided by central Although many sects fight for dominance in Chimborazo, governments. On the Bolivian edge of Lake Titicaca, Seventh- U.S.-based World Vision seems to be outspending all the others. Day Adventists got a foot in the door by providing emergency World Vision is one of the largest evangelical organizations, famine relief. Once established, they extended their influence. and it has a generous budget to support its work in eighty They prohibited the raising of llamas and alpacas. Adventists countries. Annual expenditures in Central America alone reached follow Old Testament dictates that designate cloven-hoofed $10 million in 1983. Founded by conservative fundamentalists, animals "unclean." Thus, Adventist Indians must raise sheep, World Vision is fervently anti-communist and its big spending but sheep devastate the fragile altiplano environment. As the is having a noticeable political impact on Chimborazo. Adventist converts increase so do the number of sheep and Bishop Corral said that by sponsoring self-help projects for the amount of erosion. "It's very depressing," one aid worker those it favors, World Vision is creating envy among the Indians told British author Ronald Wright.9 and shredding the fragile social fabric woven together by Proano. The evangelicals have won many new converts in Chimborazo— vangelicals also have an impact on the cultural environ- the province is now 40 percent Protestant—but community E ment. They ride roughshod over Indian identity. The organizations are coming apart. "We can't help but think that Mormons teach that indigenous peoples are dark skinned the evangelicals are part of a wider strategy," said Corral." because their ancestors defied God, but this racist theology is only an extreme example of a principle common to the evan- f there is such a "wider strategy," Brazilian bishops suspect gelical movement. Indian converts are encouraged to discard I that its authors are in Washington. In a 1985 report pre- their traditions, especially "satanic" drinking, dancing, and pared at the request of the Vatican, the bishops suggested that music-making ceremonies. Indians must be born again into a "certain" fundamentalist sects may be partners in a "U.S. geo- new culture as well as a new religion. The new culture is more political policy" to counter the influence of progressive Cath- Bible Belt than biblical. The evangelicals preach a save-yourself olics in Latin America. The changes in the Catholic church ethic that emphasizes American-style individual advancement. have not pleased the United States. After completing an official The individualism of the evangelicals runs directly counter Latin American fact-finding tour in 1969, Nelson Rockefeller to the communitarian teachings of liberation theology. While warned that "the Catholic Church has ceased to be a reliable liberal Catholics struggle to create and sustain community ally for the U.S. and the guarantor of social stability in the organizations, the sectarian fundamentalists separate villagers continent." This warning took on a more urgent tone when

40 FREE INQUIRY security strategists for then President-elect Ronald Reagan Merrill Col7e tt called liberation theology part of a leftist challenge. Briefing officers at the U.S. military complex in Panama now list liberation theology as one of several regional threats. Such general statements don't confirm that Washington con- spires with evangelicals against progressive Catholics, but the CIA has collaborated with right-wing missionaries and clerics in the past. According to sources cited by the religion writer Penny Lernoux in her Cry of the People, Belgian Jesuit Roger Vekemans received as much as $5 million in CIA funds to sustain his anti-communist labor unions in Chile.12 John D. Marks, the former State Department intelligence analyst who wrote The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence, says a third of the church workers he interviewed for his book knew of a link with the agency.13 The evidence of CIA-church ties in Brazil, Chile, and Bolivia in the 1950s and 1960s generated so many protests that in 1976 the agency agreed to stop recruiting church workers and limit itself to "voluntary" contacts with mis- sionaries. Given the anti-communism of the evangelicals, some mis- sionaries may have volunteered for CIA duty, but that doesn't mean Washington manipulates the evangelicals. They follow Evangelical street preacher, Caracas, Venezuela. a political logic of their own; Washington simply reaps the benefits. This is true in Central America, where the evangelicals stand staunchly behind the CIA-supported Nicaraguan rebels. Televangelist Pat Robertson has reviewed contra troops in their The story is ably told in David Stoll's Fishers of Men or base camps in Honduras, put rebel leaders on his "700 Club" Founders of Empire?14 Stoll describes how the missionaries television show, and funneled aid to the contras through his demoralized the proud Huaoranis with gospel-preaching radio Operation Blessing. (The rebels reciprocated by naming one transmitters hidden in baskets of gifts and decimated them with of their units the Pat Robertson Brigade.) Two other funda- such white-man health hazards as polio and the common cold. mentalist organizations—World Gospel Outreach and Free- But Stoll is a bit too quick in writing the obituary of the dom's Friends—set up a supply line to funnel millions of dollars Huaoranis. Although their numbers have been reduced to a in aid to the contras and their families, according to journalist thousand or so, they still struggle violently to survive. Last Michael D'Antonio. Writing in the Alicia Patterson Foundation summer a group of Huaoranis, the Tagairis, killed two Roman Reporter (Fall 1987), D'Antonio cites one of the supply-line Catholic missionaries serving as an advance team for foreign organizers as saying, "Without us the freedom fighters [contras] oil firms. The Tagairi tribesmen would have none of it, and would have been in rough shape the last few years." the consortium has had to postpone its project indefinitely. Evangelicals serve American economic, as well as political, While the Huaoranis fight a rear-guard action, other Ecua- objectives in Latin America. Fundamentalist missionaries have doran Indians are on the offensive. The Quichua and Shuar played a vanguard role in opening up resource-rich territories tribes have founded an impressive national organization that to development by multinational companies. The U.S.-based unites 90,000 Indians in a common effort to gain legal claim Summer Institute of Linguistics, also known as the Wycliffe to their traditional territories. The organization, the Confed- Bible Translators, was instrumental in pacifying untamed Indian eration of Indian Nations of the Ecuadoran Amazon, is led populations that stood in the path of progress in Ecuador's by a new generation of Indian activists who are equally at Amazon basin. ease in the capital city of Quito as in backwater jungle villages. Ecuador's northern jungle region holds the country's most What makes them more effective than their forebears is the important petroleum-producing provinces. They were once the schooling they received in Christian missions, including those domain of the ferocious Huaorani Indians. Huaorani attacks run by the Summer Institute of Linguistics. The missionary on Shell Oil Company geologists impeded the exploitation of teachers thought they were molding new believers, but their the region, but in 1956 the Indians made a strategic error. They Indian students had other ideas. speared to death five American evangelical missionaries. It was This unexpected result of missionary endeavors in Ecuador a Pyrrhic victory. Life magazine beatified the martyrs and the reflects the wider challenge to Christian conservatives. Latin word went out to the Bible Belt. Missionaries from the Summer America's grim social reality "tempts" evangelical converts to Institute of Linguistics arrived in droves. Working with the social action. Conversion itself can pave the way by opening oil companies, they herded the Indians along a Pilgrim's up a greater sense of life's possibilities. The new Protestant Progress that relocated them far away from the advancing oil rejects traditional religion. Will he also reject traditional in- fields. The former Huaorani territory now holds the jungle justice? headquarters of Texaco. One who did was Emilio Roman Lopez, a Protestant pastor

Fall 1988 41 and a Cakchiquel Indian from Guatemala. Roman took part Notes in the government land-reform program that came to an end with the 1954 CIA coup. He then became active in electoral 1. Penny Lernoux, "Hallelujuh! Bringing Politics Closer to God," World politics but his efforts were blocked by the regime. He died Paper, March 1988. fighting in the leadership of the Cakchiquel contingent of a 2. Mildred Spain, And in Samaria: A Story of More than Sixty Years' leftist guerrilla group. Missionary Witness in Central America, 1890-1954, Revised and Extended Dissident spin-offs from the evangelical movement are be- Edition (Dallas: Central American Mission, 1954), pp. 4-5 as cited in Deborah Huntington, "The Prophet Motive," NACLA Report on the Americas, Vol. coming more common. In the shanty towns of the Peruvian 18, No. 1 (January-February 1984), p. 5. city of Chiclayo, community-minded evangelicals split from 3. Tom Buckley, Violent Neighbors, (New York: Time Books, 1984), their conservative churches to launch a local organizing effort. p. 264. In Chile, Jimmy Swaggart's endorsement of Pinochet prompted 4. Deborah Huntington, "God's Saving Plan," loc. cit., p. 26. 5. Cynthia Brown, ed., With Friends Like These, (New York: Pantheon progressive evangelicals to send a formal protest. In Colombia, Books, 1985), p. 201. the army has accused some evangelical churches of sharing 6. Pastoral letter, Episcopal Conference of Guatemala (May 27, 1982) their tithe with guerrillas. And in Honduras, when the govern- as cited in Brown, ibid., p. 183. ment replaced a liberal Catholic refugee relief agency with con- 7. George Sullivan-Davis, "Swaggart Crusade Divides Evangelicals in Chile," (Lima: Latinamerica Press March 5, 1987), p. 7. servative Protestants, a dissident group grew up among the 8. Author interview with Magin, Caracas, Venezuela, June 1987. Protestants. "Our work with refugees has opened our eyes," 9. Ronald Wright, Cut Stones and Crossroads, (New York: Viking Press, Noemi de Espinoza, the group's president, told a reporter.ls 1984), p. 198. 10. Author interview with Corral, Chimborazo, September, 1986. Socially conscious evangelicals are still a small minority, Il. Ibid. but their numbers are likely to grow as visions of salvation 12. Penny Lernoux, Cry of the People, (New York: Penbuin, 1980). collide with the rock-hard reality of living at the bottom of 13. Richard Rashke, "CIA Funded, Manipulated Missionaries," National the social pyramid. After the televangelist's image fades from Reporter, Aug. 1, 1975. 14. David Stoll, Fishers of Men or Founders of Empire? (London: Zed the screen; after the revivalist folds up his tent; after the blond, Press, 1982), p. 278 ff. blue-eyed missionaries go back to the Bible Belt; Latin Amer- 15. Ivan Santiago, "U.S.-Backed Pentecostals Win Honduran Converts," ica's poor Protestants will still have to struggle to survive. • Latinamerica Press, April 17, 1986, p. 7. •

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42 FREE INQUIRY is a lion behind every bush. Frenzied injunc- tions warn us of their lastest "dangers," from Viewpoints humanism to abortion. I am sure of one thing. If you are hiking along a narrow ledge, overlooking a chasm, you certainly do not Organized Religion Not Required want a frenzied, fear-filled person as your leader or guide. It is not through panic and For Moral Life fanatic frenzy that human beings find right answers for contemporary society—it is through knowledge and enlightenment. Tragically, more often than not it has been William Edelen religion that leads us away from knowledge. orality does not depend on religion. Witch Trials to "religion" supporting the Without religion, responsible and just M I am talking about organized reli- obscenities of World Wars I and II, and from human beings, free of fear, can use their gion. I am not talking about living one's life Vietnam to Central America, from Northern reason and find solutions to human prob- filled with wonder over the sacred dimen- Ireland to the Gaza Strip. lems. Without religion they can contribute sions of existence. A person can be filled So, let us clear away the cobwebs of toward developing the potential for human with the sacred in the most profound sense thought that equate "morality" and "reli- growth. Without religion they can be dedi- and have no use for organized religion. gion." Many of the most moral, most ethical, cated to education, human rights, democ- In fact it is those people who understand most just and righteous people in the history racy, cultural development, and civil rights. the sacred dimensions of the earth and their of civilization have not had any use for either Without religion, there would be today far relationship to it that are usually the most the Bible or organized religion. more women's rights. Without religion, there moral and the most ethical. And so, it is We also hear that threadbare phrase that would be today far more compassion and "organized religion" and morality that I am "without the fear of punishment or judgment understanding in Northern Ireland, Africa, writing about here. [or some other fundamentalist fantasy] the Gaza Strip, and the United States. No more meaningless or inane a cliché people will not do good or be moral." Again, Morality does not need religion and, in is promoted by organized religion than the fact that this is not true could be docu- fact, it is religion that often leads to a total "Without religion people would not be mented by looking at the millions of good, breakdown in morality. • moral" or "The Bible is where our morality just, and moral human beings who do not comes from." Anyone swallowing this believe in punishment or divine `judgment" hogwash should do a little reading, starting of any kind. They are good and moral simply The Rev. William Edelen is a columnist and with all of the immorality that saturates the because it is right and it contributes to a author and the pastor of the Community Bible, and then move on through the history harmonious society. Congregational Church in McCall, Idaho. of the church from Constantine to the Salem Much of religion appeals to fear. There

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Fall 1988 43 proper music, wearing the proper gemstones, transfixed, in rapt attention. products work because they are "scientific." or sitting in a mirror-lined box under Believers who thought they were wit- A typical example was the "Amazing pulsating lights. nessing a genuine psychic miracles accepted Nuclear Receptor" available for $90 and No matter how complex a problem is— several spectacular, but undemonstrated created by the "science of counter-tech- be it AIDS, pollution, or the threat of a claims: that Geller could transform lead into nology." It was a patterned medallion with nuclear war, there is someone at the Whole gold, for instance, and that he could psy- a rhinestone suspended over the center that Life Expo willing and eager to sell a simple chically locate vast mineral deposits hidden supposedly protected the wearer by chang- solution. Health-conscious consumers are underground. ing "toxic pollution" into "beneficial told that they can counteract damaging en- ' The Expo also provided an opportunity energy." Nothing in the jargon-loaded vironmental influences simply by sur- for people to recreate their childhood fan- pamphlet that came with the device rounding themselves with the proper geo- tasies. One such fantasy commonly occurs resembled any of the known principles of metric configurations or by wearing specially when a child discovers that his parents are traditional science. selected quartz crystals. War and AIDS can not perfect or godlike—he may protect him- So which authority should we accept? be eliminated by "visualizing" peace and self from insecurity by imagining that his Traditional science, with its carefully docu- health. real parents are a king and queen who will mented body of accumulated experience and This explains the success of the Whole come for him soon, allowing him to claim evidence that states that this device will not Life Expo and the New Age movement in his birthright. The most obvious example work, or the authority of an inventor who general—they offer simple answers to com- of this myth pattern was offered by the offers only his fervent belief in "alternative plicated problems. people from the "Unarius Academy," who technology" to back up his extraordinary Everyone attending the Expo is given a sincerely believe that they had previous lives claims? wonderful ego massage. For example, a on other planets; that Atlantis will rise out Would it really be a good idea to send request for information at a booth brings of the Caribbean in the year 2001; and that people to clean up toxic-waste spills armed a typical response: "You are very special, very flying saucers will descend to meet it, only with their "Amazing Nuclear Recep- important to us.... Was it some inner voice bringing with them esoteric knowledge that tors"? Any volunteers? that prompted your inquiry, a need to will rescue humanity. Another New Age theme that frequently understand your purpose for coming to this Such empowerment fantasies are a cen- surfaced in the call for "alternative solutions" planet?" The pursuit of a higher state of tral focus of the New Age movement. Un- was the open rejection of rationality. The consciousness becomes an end in and of fortunately, New Agers longing for power reasoning goes something like this: Rational itself. Nobody says what a person is expect- and knowledge are often led to dogma and thought brought us science. Science brought ed to do once he or she arrives at the Expo. authoritarianism. It is ironic that a move- us pollution and the threat of thermonuclear But those who attend are set up to feel as ment that so openly espouses independence war. Therefore, we must reject rationalism if they are making a terrific contribution to and self-control leads many New Agers only and science if we are to solve our problems. the Grand Order of the Cosmos just by to exchange one authority for another. For New Agers seem to be confusing science "being"—and buying. example, many New Agers take on a child- with technology. Pure science is a careful Even more seductive is the constant ap- like attitude when in their search for spir- and well-tested method for discovering and peal to "personal experience," which can be itual fulfillment they are presented with the describing how our universe works. That's far more persuasive and convincing than unquestionable and unchallangeable pro- it, and in and of itself, it involves no applica- logic or reason. In our increasingly cold and nouncements of charismatic leaders who tions. It is the demand created by society manipulative world it is easy to understand claim to have a direct channel to pure "astral that directs the application of that knowl- why people may consider their personal knowledge." edge to destructive or constructive tech- experience to be their last hope for main- Followers are encouraged to think of nology. taining personal integrity and individuality. themselves as badly in need of enlightenment The New Age argument against rational- But if you assume that your "gut feeling" and are always placed on the lowest rung ity and science simply ignores the complex or intuition is immune to the corrupting of the spiritual ladder. This is reflected in relationship between science, technology, big influences of the outside world, you will be the many colorfully illustrated "Maps of the business, and politics. What chance do we especially vulnerable. When you are faced Cosmos" (charts showing levels or stages have of solving global problems like nuclear with experiences you do not fully under- through which students are to progress) stockpiling, acid rain, the destruction of rain stand, you are even more open to manipu- being sold or displayed at the Expo. Any forests and topsoil, and overpopulation, if lation. number of steps, from five to infinity, must we forfeit rationality? For example, one of the major speakers be mastered before self-realization or Furthermore, many New Agers are con- at this year's Expo was the world-famous nirvana is reached. In every case the "You tent to keep the status quo. For instance, Israeli "psychic" Uri Geller. People paid $30 are here" sign is placed firmly on the bottom Shirley MacLaine has popularized the con- each, expecting to experience the para- rung. No group at the Expo suggested to cept of Karma—the idea that circumstances normal. Spoons were broken, watches were potential members that they might have in one's present life are either a reward or repaired, messages were transmitted via climbed even one rung up the ladder by a punishment for conduct in a previous life: "telepathy," and radishes were sprouted themselves. Before we are born, we personally choose through "psychokinesis." Judging from the Another example of the substitution of our parents, our social situation, and even lukewarm applause throughout the show, one authority for another was evident in the the genetic diseases we may suffer, in order about half the audience may have been way many products at the Expo were pro- to get the experiences we need for spiritual wondering whether Geller's "powers" weren't moted. Traditional science is dismissed with growth. This philosophy, originally de- just simple stage magic. But those with no a shrug of the shoulders when it challenges veloped under the rigid and cruel caste sys- alternative explanation for Geller's powers the validity of a New Age product—yet tem, provides a comfortable way for the suc- accepted his psychic explanation and sat inventors and vendors claim that these cessful to avoid social responsibility. Can we

44 FREE INQUIRY really consider ourselves morally and spir- of it. The New Age has confused poetry with saving the world, but in reality they are itually enlightened if we sit at our lavish- objective reality. Myths and metaphors that throwing away the very tools that are neces- ly spread tables watching the children of may be deeply meaningful as models for sary to effect any change. • Ethiopia on television, smug in the knowl- personal growth become dangerously dog- edge that we earned our good fortune and matic and authoritarian when they are taken that those frail children with bloated bellies literally. People who abandon reason, sci- Al Seckel is a physicist and the executive deserve their bad fortune? ence, and a questioning approach are de- director of the Southern California Skep- Never has there been so much talk about prived of the ability to fully interact, under- tics. Pat Linse is an artist and a member the total transformation of society with so stand, and change our world. The New Agers of SCS. little hope of anything positive coming out think that by saving themselves they are

have no success in any of your ways. You will be constantly cheated and robbed, and More from Hook and Homnick no one will help you... . You will be an object of horror, a by- word and an abject lesson among all the nations where G-d will lead you... . You will have sons and daughters, but The following represents the latest volley in the ongoing exchange between Yaakov Homnick they will not remain yours, since they will and Sidney Hook. Their correspondence began in the Fall 1987 issue of FREE INQUIRY be taken into captivity... . with Homnick's response to an article by Tom Bethel in American Spectator (May 1987) These curses will be a sign and proof called "A Stroll with Sidney Hook." Here, Homnick responds to a question posed by Sidney to you and your children forever. When you had plenty of everything, Hook: "The Holocaust—an act of a just God, an act of justice?" you would not serve G-d with happiness and a glad heart. You will therefore serve Though Dr. Hook implies that I have justi- regard this as established: a century of "En- your enemies when G-d sends them against you, and it will be in hunger, thirst, lightenment," Communism, Socialism and fied Hitler's actions, I said nothing of the nakedness and universal want. He [your sort. It would be cretinous to claim that Hit- Zionism had completely changed the char- enemy] will place an iron yoke on your ler's actions were motivated by any sense acter of European Jewry. Rabbis had been neck so as to destroy you. of justice. He was nothing but a foul mur- rendered powerless and ineffectual, and the G-d will bring upon you a nation from derer of the sort who are roundly excoriated Torah was the source of guidance to only afar, from the end of the earth, swooping throughout the biblical writings. In fact, his a paltry few. (Just to accentuate this, I would down like an eagle; a nation whose lan- claim that he was enforcing a vision of justice point out that today there are many times guage you do not understand, a sadistic in nature may be his greatest crime; worse more Yeshiva students around the world nation, that has no respect for the old and even than the carnage and pillage is the than there were in pre-war Europe.) no mercy for the young.... If you are monstrous pretense of virtue. The Torah explicitly sets this type of suf- not careful to keep all the words of this Torah ... to fear the glorious, awesome However, I did say that the Holocaust fering on a grand scale as the price of this name of G-d, then G-d will strike you and sort of betrayal. Thus, one cannot make the was an expression of G-d's justice, even a your descendants with unimaginable proof for it. That in no way mitigates the argument that the Holocaust is a proof plagues. The punishments will be terrible immorality of Hitler and his henchmen. It against the standard of justice defined by and relentless, and the diseases will be shouldn't take too subtle a thinker to under- the Torah itself. The Torah states clearly malignant and unyielding... . stand that even when the victim got what (Deuteronomy 28:15ff.): The survivors among you will be few he deserved in the eyes of G-d, the murderer in number... . is fully culpable. And it shall come to pass if you do not G-d will scatter you among the nations, heed the voice of G-d ... , then these First we must cast aside Hook's denial from one end of the earth to the other curses will come upon you and overtake ... Among those nations you will not feel of my historical veracity. He says the "vast you. Cursed you will be in the city and majority" of the six million Jews were Orth- secure, and there will be no rest for the cursed in the field.... Cursed will be the sole of your foot. There G-d will make odox, that is, fully observant. This statement fruit of your womb, the fruit of your land, you cowardly, destroying your outlook is totally ludicrous; the Orthodox segment the calves of your herd and the lambs of and making life hopeless. of the six million probably did not number your flock. Cursed you will be when you Your life will hang in suspense. Day much more than ten percent, as the Ortho- come, and cursed when you go. G-d will and night you will be so terrified, that you dox constituted only a tiny minority of the send misfortune, confusion and frustration will not believe you are alive. In the whole of European Jewry during that period. against you in all you undertake. G-d will morning you will say, "Let it be night The best proof of this can be obtained by make disease attach itself to you... . already." Such will be the internal terror G-d will strike you with consumption, looking at the minute percentage of ob- that you will experience .. . fever, delirium, paralysis, the sword .. . servant Jews among the survivors. Further- and they will pursue you until they destroy more, of those who still practiced, many were you. This tells us that (a) the Holocaust is on the way out, and still more were older G-d will strike you with insanity, blind- exactly what the Torah said would happen people whose children had already deserted, ness and mental confusion. You will grope if the Jews forsook the Law en masse, (b) whether with their tacit complicity or over around in broad daylight just like a blind that it is perfectly congruous with the Torah's their vociferous objections. Let us then man gropes in the darkness, and you will vision of justice, (c) that all the Jews who

Fall 1988 45 kept the Torah for over three millennia less body on this earth, is to do a man a with visions of freedom from G-d and the consciously accepted this as the due of de- far greater violence than to remove his body exigencies of His will. And it is followed sertion. Thus, the question "If G-d embodies from its physical abode, leaving his soul to with breathtaking immediacy by a spectac- the vision of justice described in the Torah, return to its provenance. ular reaffirmation of the specialness of the how could He allow six million Jews to be Similarly, one who violates the Sabbath Jew as the patterns of history are outrage- killed?" is inherently counterfeit. It is pre- gets a more severe form of capital punish- ously reversed and the Jewish people get cisely because He is the sort of G-d that is ment than does a murderer. Dulling the back their land. described in the Torah that He caused this awareness of the world having been created The complete absence of innocents from to happen. It is His doing, in perfect ac- is a more serious crime than removing from the roster of victims would be too conspicu- cordance with His clearly enunciated prin- the world one potential servant of its Crea- ous an indication of the hand of Providence, ciples. tor. In short, man's recognition of his disturbing the balance required for con- Hook's line of attack is rendered doubly Creator is the ultimate value; better dead tinued free choice. absurd by the realization that had the Holo- than a sinner. And many, many Jews over This, of course, begs the question of how caust not occurred, its absence could well the ages have had occasion to prove just how undeserving people can be put to death. have been the basis of a challenge to the literally this is intended. There are many ways of explaining this. But accuracy of the Torah's predictions; a plaus- Following that logic, it should be clear whether we say (1) they can be sacrificed ible argument could have been made to the that the Creator can substitute death for sin for the greater good of humanity, or (2) they effect that G-d's failure to deliver the prom- in any organism, thus not only administering will be rewarded for serving mankind and ised punishment showed that He no longer a justifiable punishment, but even improving their Creator in this way, thus fully com- felt bound by the original covenant. Con- its condition. pensating them for their ordeal, or (3) they sequently, the Holocaust emerges as a bibli- The concept of free will derives largely were given souls that for one reason or cally mandated phenomenon, that in no way from a view of creation that sees man as another had only a few years of life coming undermines the Torah's depiction of G-d's having been granted dominion and self- to them, and their deaths are orchestrated relationship to the world or to the Jews. determination. Yet, this is contingent upon to seem untimely for maximum effect, but None of this should be taken to mean his properly identifying himself as a creation. really aren't, or (4) they may well benefit that every individual consumed by the Holo- A son may be granted independence, condi- by leaving the world so pure, rather than caust must have been personally blame- tional upon his not forgetting who is his trying to weather the debilitating storms of worthy. Quite the contrary, we would prefer father. This is the basic human obligation. full lifetimes, or (5) all of the above, one to assume that a great many of them were According to the Torah, violation of the one underlying point should be obvious: It is innocent. In addition, Jewish tradition con- precondition for the gift of life—recognizing intellectually dishonest to postulate the fers upon them all the badge of martyrdom, the Creator—immediately nullifies one's existence of a Creator, and then to deny Him since they were killed for the "crime" of being right to continue enjoying His hospitality. the option of withdrawing one of His Jews. Still, when a nation is collectively If one's life, and one's autonomy, are rooted creations when He deems it important. guilty, the purging process must be a sweep- in a Creator, then denial of the Creator is We've gone on long enough, I think. It's ing one, often destroying many good apples tantamount to forfeiture of the right to time to sum up. It should be apparent by on the way to crushing the worm. either. now that I'm neither stupid, nor shallow, The Talmud makes the point that righ- Of course, the Torah's philosophical nor irrational, nor fanatical, nor closed- teous men are not only absorbed into com- world model for Jews is more severe. They minded. That does not necessarily say that munal suffering, but the most holy are taken have committed themselves to a higher level my views and my reasoning are infallible. first. Thus, punishment for the Jewish people of responsibility: not only to recognize Him But it does entitle me to put them forth in can never only be an end unto itself. It must but to serve Him constantly. By so doing, the broader marketplace of ideas. And it serve to improve, as a form of chastisement, they redefine their physical life, turning it should impose upon anyone who wishes to and must also be a redemptive and cathartic into a stepping stone to a higher existence challenge these points the responsibility to experience, both on a personal level and on that binds them closer to the Creator. articulate adequate refutations. This, I be- a plane of mystical purification. Any exercise Thus, the Jew's elan vital is the Torah. lieve, is what Dr. Hook has patently failed whose ultimate goal is to edify, to elevate, His existence is rendered void when he ab- to do. By painting his own target (his "com- to sensitize, and to redeem must depend to dicates his role as G-d's troubleshooter on mon universe of moral discourse") after first some extent on the participation of the very Earth. For him, physical life can never be shooting his arrow, he tries to make himself best people. an end. It is merely the base on which stands out a marksman. Having established that the Holocaust is a ladder that he can climb, rung by rung, —Yaakov Homnick not a contradiction of the Torah's image of finally reaching the sky. His role is similar G-d, we move along to the corollary objec- to that of an angel, defined by his link to Sidney Hook Responds tion—namely, that if the Torah claims to the divine. be the vehicle of a benevolent G-d, with the For this Jew, the translation of spiritual- Yaakov Homnick has convinced me that not goal of bringing eternal redemption and joy ity into the reality of this world expands into only do we not share a common universe to the world, how does it square such hor- every phase of living. Any expression of his of moral discourse but that we do not share rible occurrences with that vision? And how humanity without reference to his transcend- a common universe of rational discourse. He can one accept the Torah as a rational system ent essence is sin. To sin against G-d is to claims I have misunderstood him but he when it can advance the notion that such sin against himself. repeats several times that the Holocaust is awful events are a manifestation of justice? Thus, the Holocaust is not only under- an expression of divine justice, a "biblically It is worse to lead a man to sin than standable to Jews; it is actually a source of mandated phenomenon," and "perfectly to kill him, says the Talmud. To uproot the encouragement. It stands out clearly as a congruous with the Torah's version of jus- soul from its spiritual source, leaving a root- biblical phenomenon in a world intoxicated tice." He is willing to grant that 600,000 Jews 46 FREE INQUIRY were innocent of the terrible "sin" which barns so that the people may indulge in the We are not endeavoring to chain the future provoked the expression of God's justice, delights of roast pork. One day an ingenious but to free the present.... We are the apparently unaware that the God he depicts mind discovers that it is not necessary to advocates of inquiry, investigation, and thought.... It is grander to think and sounds more like a nightmarish vision of burn down the barn and incur many costly investigate for yourself than to repeat a consequences in order to enjoy roast pig. Satan. Acknowledging that these creatures creed.... I look for the day when reason, retained their innocence of sin and evil even It has often been observed that in many situ- throned upon the world's brain, shall be in their last agonies, he invokes the immoral ations the advance of civilization depends upon the King of Kings and the God of Gods. doctrine of collective guilt to cover up the applying the moral of Charles Lamb's tale. crimes against the victims, who were In justice to those with whom we hu- innocent according to Homnick's own per- manists disagree, it should be pointed out He never retreated from these statements. Ingersoll's outstanding attributes en- verse and bizarre standards. Yet they, too, that not all who accept the supernaturalistic abled him to score repeated victories over must be destroyed like worms; "... the and/ or theistic position can bring themselves purging process must be a sweeping one, to utter the monstrous judgment that the his opponents. He was a brilliant and fearless often destroying many good apples on the Holocaust is an expression of divine justice. lawyer who knew the Bible from memory, way to crushing the worm." Mr. Homnick is the only person I have ever presented his ideas in a clear and easily Homnick's metaphor is revealing. It calls met, Jew or non-Jew, who has expressed understood style, used humor effectively, into question not only God's goodness but this view. To avoid such an abomination and had tremendous confidence in his also His power. What poor finite creatures many theists would say that God is beyond abilities. can sometimes learn—to achieve a desirable good and evil; that, by definition, no human Ingersoll put these qualities to good use goal without paying the undesirable costs predicts can apply to the infinite. This is the in a June 1877 debate before three thousand involved in the initial effort to achieve it— view of Augustine, Kierkegaard, and others. people packed into the San Francisco Opera Homnick's God is unable to do. Homnick I do not believe that they or any other human House, when he issued his famous challenge would do well to reflect on Charles Lamb's beings can hold this view consistently. to twenty-six fundamentalist ministers who essay on roast pig: By accident, some pigs At any rate, to a naturalist and humanist, claimed that Thomas Paine recanted his free are consumed when the barn they are housed there is no event that is beyond the reach thinking on his deathbed. He offered $1,000 in catches on fire. The farmer who touches of moral judgment. If men build or worship in gold to anyone who could prove the claim. one of the carcasses scorches his fingers. To Gods in their own moral image, then to pay No one did so. In fact, Ingersoll later offered ease the pain he brings his fingers to his homage to a being who is indifferent to— substantial proof that Paine had never re- mouth, and the taste of roast pork is dis- or beyond—good and evil, is to express a canted. covered. Thereafter it becomes a common position that is morally unacceptable to hu- When a Reverend Banks compared In- practice in the community to burn down manists.—Sidney Hook • gersoll's meetings to a circus, Ingersoll com- pared the happy events of a circus, which brought joy to those who attended, with Banks's own dull, solemn, and uninformed sermons. When hundreds prayed outside Inger- Robert G. Ingersoll and the soll's house, hoping for his conversion, he remarked, "It reminds me of the boy who Fundamentalists of His Day squeezed his girlfriend's hand. It made him feel good and it didn't hurt her." Ingersoll waged a relentless campaign against the fundamentalist belief in hell and eternal punishment. "I honestly believe that the doctrine of hell was born in the glittering Philip Mass, Chairman, Robert Ingersoll Memorial Committee eyes of snakes that run in frightful coils watching for their prey," he wrote. "I believe e is little stuff. Bring on the Cardinals many people "The Gods" ended years of it was born with the yelping, howling, growl- H and the Pope," said Robert G. Inger- polite reactions to the abuses of orthodox ing, and snarling of wild beasts.... I despise soll (1833-1899) of a minister who wished religions: it, I defy it, and I hate it." to debate him on religion. Ingersoll posed a direct challenge to the One of the favorite pastimes of funda- An honest god is the noblest work of man. obedient practice of religious faith. He mentalist leaders was challenging Ingersoll ... God has always resembled his crea- wanted people to think for themselves, even in order to gain large audiences and fame tors. He hated and loved what they hated to question their own belief systems. This for themselves. Some even hoped to convert and loved and he was invariably found approach was intolerable to the fundamen- on the side of those in power.... Most him—a rich prize, indeed. But he was con- talists, who believed solely in faith. When of the gods were pleased with sacrifice, they closed the doors of his lecture halls, fident and fearless under wave after wave and the smell of innocent blood has ever of assaults from the clergy. been considered a divine perfume.... The he erected tents and attracted even more His first important lecture, "The Gods" principal business of their priests was to people. Indeed, sometimes churches were (1872), was viewed with considerable alarm boast about their god, and to insist that sparsely attended while large crowds by the clergy. It began with a statement of he could easily vanquish all the other gods gathered to hear "the great agnostic." religious beliefs and excesses and ended with put together. Some states had blasphemy laws that he an eloquent plea for the "trinity of science— had to confront. After Ingersoll spoke in reason, observation, and experience." For Ingersoll presented a positive alternative: Wilmington, Delaware, on the "Great In-

Fall 1988 47 fidels," the Chief Justice of the Delaware the penitentiary when they know what I a grand jury to indict him for "blasphemy." shall have to endure in the next world. Despite Ingersoll's devotion to Instead, it issued a warning: "The audacity That should satisfy them, I think. freethought, the public has remained with which the notorious blasphemer largely unaware of his legacy. FREE Ingersoll announced his purposes to lecture Many of his listeners expected him to be INQUIRY magazine is working fer- on infidelity has no parallel in the habits arrested, but the clergy and the chief of police vently to restore that legacy and has of respectable vagabondism." He was were seen to be laughing convulsively. No begun by purchasing Ingersoll's birth- threatened with a fine and imprisonment. arrest was made. What intelligence, courage, place in picturesque Dresden, New Ingersoll decided against challenging the law and showmanship! York, saving it from almost certain at that time, but his comment about the judge While Ingersoll's charm and intellect en- demolition. After extensive refur- was strong and direct: "After reading his couraged many to think, reason, and dis- bishing, the house will be turned into charge to the jury it seemed to me he had avow blind faith—within or outside of reli- a freethought and humanist museum. lied about the date of the law, 1740; had gion—his success made his religious critics Your financial support of this project risen from the dead; and gone on where he fear him. He was adviser to highly placed will be gratefully received. left off.... Against this man personally I government officials and even to presidents The Robert G. Ingersoll Memorial have nothing to say except Judge Comegys of the United States. In 1882, he delivered Committee has raised $22,000 thus far, is a Christian." He later stated, "I just left a Decoration Day speech in the presence of enabling us to purchase the Ingersoll Delaware in a state of ignorance." President Chester Arthur, cabinet members, house and reconstruct its crumbling In Hoboken, New Jersey, the matter of and legislators. The New York Sun moaned: foundations. We will need at least an- blasphemy came up again. The mayor rea- "Twenty years ago this would not have been other $6,000 to complete the restora- lized he could not prevent Ingersoll from possible. It means there is a decline in reli- tion. speaking—he did recognize that pesky gion; that there is scoffing now where We are also collecting Ingersoll amendment about "freedom of speech"—but reverence and adoration formerly prevailed." memorabilia—books, letters, photo- the blasphemy law was still in effect. Inger- Robert Ingersoll proved that humanist graphs, and period pieces—with which soll spoke before an excited, intense audi- ideas and ideals could be accepted by many. to furnish the house. We would wel- ence, which included fundamentalist mini- He was both a critic and an advocate; while come appropriate donations of such sters and the chief of police, who planned he opposed the harmful aspects of Chris- items as well as cash contributions. to arrest him. tianity he held no malice toward Christians. Finally, we hope to raise an en- His opposition to superstition and ignorance dowment fund of $350,000 to main- I don't say that the scriptures are not in- were paramount. He faced the world as it tain the house in perpetuity not only spired. 0n the contrary, I admit they are— was and left illusions to the wonderful and as a museum, but also as a library in New Jersey. I am not foolish enough creative domain of the arts, music, and and freethought conference center to question the Legislature of New Jersey. theater. He proved, by example, that one open to the public. This is what infidels say. I am simply could be happy in this world without a god Contributors of $25 or more will repeating it to you.... I can't blame the ministers for their views. They were trained through concern for the welfare of others receive a specially printed parchment in sectarian colleges, which might be called and individual creativity. He treasured in- copy of "Ingersoll's Vow," and donors "The Storm Centers of Ignorance." .. . dependence and liberty of thought. Through of $500 or more will have their names They are like the lands on the upper his words and deeds he inspired thousands inscribed on a bronze plaque that will Potomac—almost worthless by nature and of Americans to live by freethought princi- be hung in the foyer of the renovated rendered wholly so by cultivation. 1 do ples rather than by the outmoded ideas of Ingersoll house. not know why they wish to throw me in an oppressive majority. •

Atheism On Campus time when a crowd gathered it was in response to a rather heated discussion I was having with the local fundamentalists, who thought Gordon Stein that they could easily prove me wrong, and thereby convert me. Instead, they usually left ore than two and a half years I ago asked to leave a few times and was actually with their beliefs shaken and with much to M I began what seemed at the time to thrown off campus by the police once, but think about. I had prepared for these discus- be a grand adventure. I had obtained federal on the whole, the students welcomed me. sions by 20 years of studying religion, the tax exemption and a substantial foundation They were curious about what I had to say, Bible, philosophy, and, most importantly, grant for a new organization, called the Free listened attentively, and asked some intelli- atheist literature. I could see that during many Thought Association, dedicated to organizing gent questions. I kept high-quality atheist and of these discussions, ideas of a new sort were atheist students at colleges and universities. I freethought literature on my table, and made penetrating young minds, and the smiles and traveled to all of the major college campuses a mark each time someone took some of it. comments were quite gratifying. in California and set up literature tables bear- I can say with a fair amount of accuracy The history of organized atheism on col- ing a large sign saying "ATHEISTS UNITED." that over 7,000 people took literature from lege campuses goes back to some superficial Then I waited for the fireworks to begin. me. At times there were as many as fifty efforts made in the late 1920s by Charles The reception I received on almost all students gathered around the table, asking Lee Smith's American Association for the campuses was hospitable or better. I was questions or just listening. Most of the Advancement of Atheism ("the 4As"). Smith

48 FREE INQUIRY had a number of chapters of the 4As or- a few "stupid" questions, in the sense that universities. While there was much serious ganized on college campuses; among them they had not been meaningfully or properly discussion, there were a few times when a were "The Damned Souls" at the University framed. For example, "Who created life on sense of unreality pervaded. Many people of Rochester, "The Sons of Satan" at Okla- earth?" is an improper question, since it had never seen an atheist before, much less homa City University, "The Legion of the implies that there was a "someone" who any atheist literature. The general response Damned" at the University of North Dakota, created life. Because there may well not be was favorable, but it was obvious that many and a schoolchildren's group, "The Junior any such being, there is no way to answer of the campus fundamentalists thought they Atheist League." the question as framed. Properly framed, the would take advantage of the opportunity to There was a lot of newspaper publicity question would be "How did life on earth "bait the atheist." They invariably came off about both the 4As and the college groups. originate?" looking second best. My advice to those who Many people were afraid that the groups You may well ask what activities engaged would like to emulate my performances is would have substantial student membership the fifteen or so student atheist groups that know your subject. Read every book and or great influence. From talking with several I helped to start at California universities. article you can about the arguments for the people who were members of these groups, First, they used literature provided by the existence of God. Know the common I can state confidently that the groups were Free Thought Association, Atheists United, fundamentalist responses, a la Josh Mc- more or less a joke among the student mem- and other groups, to stock their own litera- Dowell. Know the weaknesses of their bers, and were organized merely as a form ture tables. These were successfully managed arguments. Know the general contents of the of rebellion to scare the administration and by several groups, most notably the one at Bible, especially the New Testament, but the public. In effect, they did nothing, and UCLA, which soon had over forty members. don't allow yourself to be drawn into an usually dissolved within a year or two. Many groups held bi-weekly or monthly argument about the meanings of various The American humanist movement tried meetings at which the student leader or a Bible verses. I always say that if you can't unsuccessfully to organize some student speaker from off-campus addressed difficult prove the existence of God first, then it is groups in the 1960s and 1970s. They faced questions and offered good ways of answer- no use quoting the Bible. It is not the "word the same problems that beset the Free ing them, or lectured on related topics. Each of God" until you have shown that there Thought Association groups in the mid- group also sent a representative to join me is a God. 1980s, namely: (1) Students tend to be busy at my literature table whenever I was on its with classes, homework, part-time jobs, and campus. I was careful to always clear my fundamentalist student at Cal State, social life, and therefore have little time or appearances with the student leader at any A San Bernadino, told me that he knew energy to devote to organizations. (2) Stu- school where a group had already been there was a God because he talked to Him dents come and go. This year's leader is next formed. Any new names on the sign-up sheet every day. The student said that God would year's graduate. Continuity of leadership is were, of course, given to the student group talk to me too, if I was honestly open to difficult to maintain. (3) Most students are to contact later. receiving Him. I asked him how this was not experienced organizers, managers, or The student groups also sponsored my done. He replied that all that was necessary leaders. The few who are may be unlikely debates, usually with the cooperation of a was to get down on one's knees in prayer. to organize an atheist group. (4) Some student Christian group, which would pro- I said that although God had never spoken students don't want it on their record that vide my opponent for the "Does God Exist?" to me, I was a seeker after truth, and would they were affiliated with an atheist group, debates. That way the Christians had only be completely willing to "open my heart" although it is doubtful that it would appear themselves to blame if they found an un- to God, if there were one. I expressed my on their record or that it would make any worthy debate opponent. Many Christians willingness to get down on my knees in difference if it did. walked out of one debate, claiming that we prayer. I said that I would throw away my From contact with thousands of college had chosen a "ringer" as the theist debater; atheist literature and become a Christian if students, I can give a few general impressions. in fact, he was a minister chosen by the God spoke to me then and there. I asked As always, there are a few deep thinkers, campus Christian group. how I would know if God were speaking concerned with issues, ideas, and the world. I have mentioned that without constant to me. The Christian said that I would know, There are also some who simply have never attention, many student "cause" groups, in- but he couldn't say how. I then asked how learned to reason well, care little about issues cluding the atheist groups, tend to fall apart long we should kneel in prayer. He suggested that they will not receive grades for studying, over time. Is there any solution to this prob- five minutes. I agreed after making a promise and assume that the world is much as their lem? Well, we can take a leaf from our op- to report honestly what happened, as I am parents told them it is. Finally, there is an ponents' book. The various campus Christian an honest man. increasingly large group who have adopted the groups stay together by finding a local resi- At that point, 1 remembered something ethic that money is the only god. They are dent who goes to the school and giving him that George Smith, the author of Atheism: only interested in achieving financial success or her a salary as part-time resident organizer The Case Against God, 'had done in a lec- and enjoying what money can buy. Anything for the group on campus. This, of course, ture. I suggested that, as I was taking a risk that doesn't seem to head them in the direction takes money, but the Christians have lots of with my beliefs in the search for truth, it of wealth is simply not important. money. We have never had enough to do was only fair that the Christian also take Lest you get discouraged at this seeming this on a large scale (as is needed). Of course, a risk. I suggested that if God did not speak lack of interest in philosophical topics on we don't have the threat of imaginary hellfire to me after the five-minute period that the the part of many students, I can state that to hold over people's heads either. student had suggested, then the student the eight debates I had on college campuses With this brief historical and factual should give up his belief in Christianity and about the existence of God were filled to overview complete, I would like to share with become an atheist. Obviously, in that case overflowing. In the question-and-answer you some of the lighter and more enlight- his statement that God speaks to anyone who sessions after these debates, many intelligent ening moments that occurred while I was openly wants to receive Him would be false. questions were asked. There were also quite tending the atheist literature tables at various In fact, his whole value system would be

Fall 1988 49 open to question. The student refused to take to stop. He responded that his action was that he could not move me with logic, he this risk. merely an exercise of his freedom to take began to get vindictive. He said that I should By this time about fifteen Christians had any or all of our literature. I replied that not be allowed on campus, because I was gathered around us. I explained to them the while he was welcome to take one copy of doing a lot of harm. I replied that that was terms of the challenge and offered to give each item, to take the whole pile was simply his opinion, that the university permitted me prayer a chance with any or all of them. theft. on campus, that many students were inter- They all refused. I asked why they should At this point there were perhaps ten peo- ested in what I had to say, and that I did be afraid of this test, as they all felt one- ple standing around the table. The student not have to take orders from him. He told hundred percent certain that God would talk who took the material was quickly contra- me I had better not come back and that to me. A few questioned whether I would dicted by all of the students standing nearby. it was lucky he did not have a match with report my experiences honestly. I assured They were unanimous in supporting my him, or he would set fire to my table. He them I would. One finally said that he would position that what the student had done was could easily have obtained a match from put away his Bible for a day and not pray theft and therefore was wrong. After a few someone standing nearby had he really during that time if God did not talk to me. minutes of this, the student who had taken wanted one. Instead, he left, promising that I said I was willing to convert for the rest the material put it back in its proper place if I was there when he returned, he would of my life, and that was what I expected and publicly apologized, saying he was mis- set fire to my table. I told him he would of him as well, if there were no answer to taken. He then slunk away, looking quite be doing his studying in jail if he did, and our prayers. dejected. It was a morality lesson in real life then urged some of his friends to calm him We had reached an impasse. None of the that could have been no better scripted had down so that he would not do something Christians there would accept my challenge. it come from a movie. he would later regret. He did not return Finally the fifteen Christians kneeled in a A student came up to my table at the during the remainder of my two-hour stay. circle at the side of my atheist literature table. University of California at San Diego and It was interesting to see how someone They said they would be praying for me. told me that he knew that God existed be- could, in fifteen minutes, go from being a As I usually do when people say they will cause of all the miracles that had happened Christian concerned for my spiritual well- pray for me, I said "Go right ahead. I can to him. I told him that I was glad to have being to a Christian determined to silence use all the help I can get." A campus finally met someone to whom miracles had me by violence and arson. Perhaps beneath newspaper photographer was present and actually happened. I asked him to tell me many a "loving Christian" there lurks a took a picture of me by the table, with all about his very best miracle. This was his "hating Christian." of the Christians kneeling next to me in story: Many other incidents occurred during prayer. The picture appeared the next day He was driving his car one night and my time on the campuses, but space does on the front page of the Chronicle. It re- the battery went dead. He pushed his car not allow for a full report. It has been an mains my favorite campus picture. to a nearby gas station and had the battery interesting three years. Most rewarding were char1;;,d. He prayed that the car would work spontaneous comments of the "I'm glad you t the University of Southern Cali- long enough to get him back to his fraternity are here" variety, as well as the many looks A fornia, I had just set up the literature house (a twenty-minute drive). When he left of sudden comprehension on the faces of table when a group of about thirty school- the gas station, his car worked fine until he students who finally understood a philo- children, led by their teacher, walked by. pulled it up to the fraternity house, at which sophical point they had never before been They must have been about eight years old, point it again died. able to grasp. It was also encouraging that and were obviously on a class trip to see That was his best miracle. I told the stu- a large number of students signed up for what a university was like. The children were dent that I would have been much more campus discussion groups and an even larger naturally curious. As they passed my table, impressed if he had not put a charge into number came by my table again on my sub- about four of them took a pamphlet or two. his battery, but had merely prayed that his sequent visit to their campus to tell me how They had no idea what the literature was car would start without help from the gas- much they enjoyed reading the literature that about, but it was free. I had made no at- station attendant. they had taken the first time. There is tempt to give them any materials, but when A group of students often gathered in definitely room for atheist, secular humanist, they stopped at the table and asked if they front of the building where I set up my table and free-thought groups on campuses, and could have some, I told them to help them- at Cal State University, Northridge. They there are many thousands of skeptics and selves. One of their teachers, upon seeing talked and joked among themselves after free thinkers among the college students of what type of literature the children had class. Finally, several came over to my table today. • taken, grabbed the leaflets from their hands and one young man asked why I was there. and ripped the papers in half. She threw the I explained that it was to distribute informa- Editor's Note: FREE INQUIRY would like to torn pieces to the ground. I remarked that tion about atheism. He asked if I wasn't try to establish secular humanist groups on she was very intolerant, but the children got afraid of going to hell. I thanked him for campuses. If you would like to help, please no atheist literature that day. his concern for my well-being, but assured contact Tim Madigan at FREE INQUIRY, P.O. At Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, I was him that I wasn't worried. He asked how Box 5, Buffalo, New York 14215. momentarily distracted by a question from I could be an atheist when the evidence for a student at one end of the table. I turned the existence of God was everywhere. I asked slightly to answer him. Out of the corner him to give me one piece of that evidence. Gordon Stein, PhD., is a biologist and an of my eye, I saw a student at the other end "The fact that you are standing at this table," authority on the history and literature of of the table pick up an entire pile of literature he replied. I asked how that proved the atheism. He is the author of six books on and start to walk away. He must have existence of God. He was unable to answer, atheism and the editor of The Encyclopedia grabbed twenty-five copies of each of several and soon showed himself to be almost totally of Unbelief. pamphlets. I immediately called out to him incapable of logical thought. When he saw

50 FREE INQUIRY larly in WWL2M. She ain't jokin', guys. She isn't gaffing about bad breath, B.O., ingrown toenails, or hirsuteness. Some of the crises Books she recounts, purportedly gleaned from the lives of her clients in private practice, are real and familiar. No one argues that some couples should never tie the knot. Other love matches should not be prolonged when the attachment is an end in itself, despite ugly "Love Addiction" scenes, hurts, and ill will. Some marriages and soul-mate situations are akin to golems or psychic monsters. This isn't new stuff. Did we need WWL2M and Letters? The books are dubious as self-improve- William F. Ryan ment manuals except as subject for debate. Norwood builds a case for and reinforces Women Who Love Too Much, by Robin tion WWL2M for her first work. That initial the conclusion that most women who are Norwood (New York: Pocket Books, 1986), volume is subtitled When You Keep Wishing so entangled in painful relationships are the 302 pp., $4.95. Hardcover edition published and Hoping Hell Change. The core thesis adult children of alcoholics. This proposition by Jeremy P. Tarcher, Inc./St. Martin's Inc., of the two books is that an alarming per- isn't new either. Whether it has merit is 1985. centage of women are perennially victimized highly questionable. She expands the cate- by the insensitivity, misbehavior, psycho- gory to include love-hungry women—and Letters From Women Who Love Too Much, neuroses, sociopathy—and often even mi- men—who were raised in dysfunctional by Robin Norwood (New York: Pocket sogyny—of their love mates. These women families, scarred with strife and discord. In Books, 1988), 352 pp., $18.95. began by choosing Mr. Wrong and are prone her Letters she allots a chapter to correspon- to select some other unredeemable lout every dence received from male readers of odern maxims apply when some of time; they pay dearly for molding their lives WWL2M and her pensées on those epistles. M us get stung, short-changed, strung around such bad matches and ignoring their In a preamble she confesses that she has out, strung up, or worse. Here's one you'll own needs for too long. The relationships never truly understood the peculiar pathol- never see on a Salada tea bag: When you're serve them little or nothing. Their self-esteem ogy of male relationship-addicts. Face it, put down or put upon, put up a put-on. goes out the window. All the while, these they're undoubtedly a distinct phylum. She It's had practical application in peculiar sensitive, loving females try their damnedest bequeaths this subject to a male specialist. places and in ax-grinding minds at all times. to effect profound personality changes in One, presumably, with pen envy. Especially now, in this epoch of the quick their recalcitrant husbands or beaux. Inevit- Before she reproduces several specimens kill, the cheap shot, and the inflatable lie. ably it's a no-win situation. The women in of mail from men, Norwood delivers some Some of us wonder why things sweet and Norwood's tracts choose lovers who are post-feminist cant about society's role in easy, like man-woman love, are now on the intractable hard cases. Then they are driven entrenching relationship addiction as a given national petri dish. There's cause enough to by an unconscious and unchecked urge to in a male-dominated culture. She sings sev- worry about AIDS and starving babies, but transform their men, make them over, exor- eral reprises from WWL2M. The reprints of now comes the photogenic Robin Norwood, cise their demons. All the while, says Nor- men's letters—some are lengthy—are clear- the West Coast psychologist and guru to wood, the real dybbuk is within the haunted ly meant to buttress her jaundiced views about confused women, whose first best-seller, minds of the women, who were traumatized the writers of such neurotic missives. Men Women Who Love Too Much, has rocked from early childhood by destructive house- are heavies, villains, psychotics, droolers, the top-ten lists of self-improvement and self- hold environments. schizophrenics, sleazes, and schlemiels. Her help paperbacks for the past two years. Her This is where I take emphatic exception selection of letters is deft. She finds kindness second book, Letters From Women Who to these persuasive books. What galls me for gay men with relationship problems, as Love Too Much, is almost certain to be a is the author's insistence that the women of if they're the only souls worth saving. drugstore sleeper, emblazoning her name as her case histories are afflicted with a physio- Her books are patently one-sided. Nor- doyenne of disgruntled housewives and logical addiction heretofore unrecognized or wood doesn't rail against machismo but bedeviled damoiselles. Her books are ignored; an addiction, not to any external doesn't mind layering several coats of male terrible: first, because they're unnervingly substance, but to relationships. She refers psychic brutality over what we used to accept convincing; second, because they're beguil- to her clients as "man junkies," and the as coupling, marriage, the family. In ing and misleading; third, because despite moniker has gotten around. Norwood's WWL2M, she hints that some men can be all claims and endorsements to the contrary, WWL2M includes a parabolic set of charts burned by attachments to women: zoo scraps they're reductive and potentially destructive to show graphically how a woman's addic- to wild beasts. The books present an episodic of the mental-health professions. Other tion to lousy relationships with men will ulti- double feature of soap-opera vignettes, women have since authored still more mately break down her physiology, as any mainly for and about yuppie women on or softbound slickensides espousing and ampli- narcotic destroys the human body. Toss this off the make. Years ago these women gob- fying Norwood's views. The market is there one around with medical doctors and other bled Cosmopolitan religiously. Now their and ripe for a cash-in. The untold impact scientists. I did, and it's rubbish. summer lawns are choked with crab grass. on Gothic romances and sexy spy thrillers It was predictable that the Old Girls' Norwood addresses them the way a dorm must be considerable. Network would get a lot of mileage out of mother would. She is chaperone at all the In Letters, Norwood uses the abbrevia- Norwood's briefs against menkind, particu- cotillion dances; the whisper in the freshly Fall 1988 51 pierced ear, warning that all men are ogres with Robin Norwood. In 1983, the bio- of adrenalin addiction right now but is not and lechers. chemist Stanley Sunderwirth and the psy- ready to utter a word. Until it is, you should In both books Robin Norwood acknowl- chologist Harvey Milkman coauthored an know that Martin Groder, M.D., a psychia- edges the help of some bright people. None article for Psychology Today comparing trist at Duke University and a student of seems to have reminded her of the female "self-induced changes in neurotransmission" the late Eric Berne, told me that he has been despots of history, the mantraps, the femmes with drug and alcohol addiction. The two theorizing about "situational addiction" and fatales, the sirens of wrack and ruin: Salome, academicians have since expanded their hy- "adrenalin addiction" since the early 1970s. who belly danced for Herod and won the pothesis in a book, Craving for Ecstasy: The He just doesn't have the visibility of a lady head of John the Baptist; Cleopatra; Joan Consciousness and Chemistry of Escape with movie-star looks who decides when of Arc; Catherine the Great; Mata Hari; (Lexington Books/D. C. Heath and Com- you're too excited and too much in love. • Magda Lupescu; Eva Perón; Christine pany, 1987). Their rather fulsome text in- Keeler; Madame Nhu; Indira Gandhi. The cludes a self-evaluation quiz: "Am I a Love literature of the world is littered with sly ladies Addict?" William F. Ryan is a freelance writer and who raised armies and launched a thousand A spokesman for the National Institute literary scholar who lives in the Washing- ships and drove men mad. No history, written of Mental Health told me that an agency ton, D.C. area. or oral, can resist recording all those crimes team of experts is looking into the question of passion. Robin Norwood can. She has another word for passion: addiction. The two volumes, like fatal sisters, have a warped approach to human nature. The mutual attraction of the sexes is a kaleido- scope of emotions common to most of us Joseph Campbell and Myth who are reasonably well adjusted and adapt- able and glad to be alive. But Norwood is so locked into her understanding of what she calls "relationship addiction" that she seems to diminish some salient features of Tom Franczyk basic biology and psychology. She is far The Power of Myth, by Joseph Campbell more interested in breaking in an Orwellian The Power of Myth shows the multi- with Bill Moyers, edited by Betty Sue newspeak for discourse on some very old faceted approach Campbell takes when deal- Flowers (New York: Doubleday, 1988), 231 problems in human relations. Do we need ing with his subject matter. He looks at myth pp., $19.95 a new language simply because Robin Nor- in the context of history, psychology, liter- wood has made old troubles sound like new ature, and, yes, spirituality. Campbell's spiri- People say that what we're all seeking is ones? Facts are facts, no matter what side tuality, however, is not of any conventional you're on. a meaning for life. I don't think that's what we're really seeking. I think that what we're conception—you will have to read this book Norwood's most odious disservice is that seeking is an experience of being alive, so to put it in context. she has coinvented a disease. The broadcast that our life experiences on the purely When he retells ancient stories, Camp- media, popular magazines, and a number physical plane will have resonances within bell gives them new life. In doing so he of books, taking a cue from Norwood's our own innermost being and reality, so explains how modern institutionalized reli- minions among convenience-store therapists that we actually feel the rapture of being gion has failed to change, as it must to inspire across the land, have dubbed it "love alive. and help unite the world's people. Conven- addiction." True believers look to WWL2M —Joseph Campbell 1904-1987 tional religions have failed to see that their as a primary study guide on cause and effect, stories are metaphors for inner drives and wherein Norwood links "relationship addic- his short book, with copious photo- emotions. They seem to get "hung up" on tion" (she doesn't call it "love addiction") T graphs and illustrations, is the result the metaphor as fact. Campbell finds this to a surge of adrenalin in the classic fight- of many hours of taped conversations be- rather absurd. or-flight situation. The adrenalin rush of tween Bill Moyers and the late Joseph Campbell does not debunk mythology emotional crisis, she says, is the same one Campbell and was published as a compan- or religion, but rather puts them where they received during one of those fabulous flights ion text for the PBS television series of the may rightly belong: in the "heart." In fact, into new love and amorous excitement. She same name. he believes that myth is necessary in life to abruptly deserts the pursuit of this chimera The quotation above probably sums up keep us from becoming automatons. Al- without dropping off a clear lead. But the the gist of the book as well as any review though some may not agree with him on implication is plainly that the "man junkie" can, and Campbell elaborates on this idea with this point, his argument is cogent. is addicted to her own adrenalin. brilliant, if sometimes paradoxical, insight. I highly recommend this book for the When I first read of this anomaly, it came Moyers asks pointed and unabashed questions glimpse it provides into the mind of an across like the ancients' phlogiston hypothe- that enhance the flavor of this discussion, extraordinary scholar and teacher in his twi- sis, or the Medieval theory of the four making it much more interesting than the light years—and recommend The Masks of God "humors." But the shamans who score time standard interview format usually is. for those who want more than a glimpse. • on radio talk programs take "adrenalin Campbell, in my opinion, is the out- addiction" as fact and, indeed, as the standing mythologist of modern time; his penumbra of "love addiction." I thought I'd masterwork, the four-volume The Masks of Tom Franczyk is co-editor of the Secular be a nice guy and investigate. As it hap- God; is ample evidence of his contribution Humanist Bulletin. pens, "adrenalin addiction" didn't originate to the study of mythology and religion. 52 FREE INQUIRY Books in Brief FROM THE SUBSCRIBER Alley, Robert S. The Supreme Court on former president of the American Ethical SERVICE Church and State. New York, Oxford Uni- Union, the purpose of this book is twofold: versity Press, 1988. $45.00, cloth, $15.95, to provide a general introduction to ethical DEPARTMENT paper. 445 pp. This expanded edition of the and religious humanism for the general volume edited in 1962 by Joseph Tussman reader and to offer a "deeper understanding" Difficulties with your subscription often can has the same rationale as the original. It is of the ethical culture movement to those be avoided by simply knowing how a maga- zine works. an attempt to make the work of the Supreme already involved in liberal church fellowships Here are answers to some questions you Court available to the general public. The and humanistic religious associations. The may have about your subscription to FREE collection of Supreme Court cases deals with book maintains that humanism affirms the INQUIRY. the principle of religious freedom and the freedom, dignity, and well-being of all people history of the Establishment and Free- as the object of a moral life, without belief Inquiries Exercise clauses of the First Amendment. in a supernatural power or supreme being. When writing to us about your subscrip- tion, please attach the current mailing label. Most cases are presented in their entirety The author has thought it necessary to in- It helps us to identify your account and accompanied by essential dissenting opin- clude in an appendix his testimony before provide much faster service. ions. Alley's introduction and the reprint of the Senate Armed Services Committee con- Tussman's 1962 introduction provide helpful cerning the religious basis of conscientious Address change background and context for the selections. objection as applied by ethical humanism. If you plan to change your address, The current national dialogue concerning please notify us six weeks before the change, Barnhart, Joe E. Jim and Tammy: Charis- "original intent" and non-preferentialism is due to our advanced addressing schedule. matic Intrigue Inside PTL. Prometheus examined and a chart of Supreme Court Books, Buffalo, N.Y., 1988. 272 pp. with Expiration Date Justices' votes serves as a useful summary photos, $18.95 cloth. Barnhart delves If you'd like to check on your expiration and reference. In addition to Supreme Court beyond the superficial in his analysis of this date, simply look at your mailing label. 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Is it possi- electronics with apocalyptic rage, and sincere If you receive two copies of an issue, ble to live the good life and be a responsible human compassion with unconscionable compare mailing labels. Any difference, moral agent without belief in religion? Paul cynicism to give a new American social class however minor, could cause the problem. Kurtz affirms that it is, at a time when non- the religious justification for its staggering Please send us both labels and tell us which one is correct. Well correct the situation at theist ethics are under attack from many upward mobility. At times meandering once; however, due to our addressing sched- quarters. Kurtz maintains that by breaking (Barnhart aims a number of jabs at Vatican ule, this problem may linger for one or two the bonds of theistic illusion we can summon finances and details papal murder plots), Jim issues. 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If this happens to principles and values in autonomous reason love and deceit, theatricality and misplaced you, simply disregard the second notice. —eating the Forbidden Fruit of the tree of idealism, all in the name of the Lord. knowledge of good and evil—that we can Invitation to subscribe Hoffmann, R. Joseph. Celsus on the True discover significant moral truths to guide We often purchase the mailing lists of Doctrine. A Discourse Against the Chris- other magazines and organizations, and you both self-reliant conduct and consideration tians. New York and Oxford, Oxford Uni- may receive an invitation to subscribe to for the rights of others. This book provides versity Press, 1987. 146 pp. $12.95, paper. FREE INQUIRY if your name is on one of a strong and positive affirmation of the these lists. Please simply disregard this un- This is the first complete English translation principles basic to humanism, and is an im- avoidable duplication. of Christianity's most ardent second century portant addition to the humanist's library. critic, whose work is preserved in the writing FREE INQUIRY Ericson, Edward L. The Humanist Way: An of the church father Origen of Alexandria. Box 5, Buffalo, NY 14215-0005 Introduction to Ethical Humanist Religion. The highly readable translation includes an New York, Frederick Ungar/Continuum, introduction to the history of anti-Christian (716) 834-2921 1988. 205 pp. According to the author, a literary polemic before Celsus.

Fall 1988 53 piece of patristic logic that translates to mean "Jesus was vulnerable to the same passions as any man and was capable of suffering Film and dying, like any man.» But it was not a view invented by the early Christian fathers. It was, for them, the view of the authors of the New Testament and one that The Last Temptation of Christ needed to be driven home to the heretics who denied the completeness of Jesus' human nature. Jesus was tempted—not once, but often. R. Joseph Hoffmann His followers tempt him to anger (Mark 8:17) and exasperated resignation (Mark he Jesus of history had always been an gnostics, is all god, one whose humanity has 8:33); his bitterness toward the Pharisees is T embarrassment to the early church. The been thoroughly supplanted by his divinity. palpable in all recorded encounters between controversy surrounding Martin Scorsese's The little children who sit on Jesus' lap in them. More impressively, especially with a latest film, The Last Temptation of Christ, their gospel are sitting on God's lap, and view to Nikos Kazantzakis's novel and Scor- has raised this embarrassment anew, and it the Jesus who drives the money-changers out sese's cinematic rendering of it, the Jesus of has finally and dramatically exposed a fact of the temple precinct is Yahweh overcoming the Gospels, especially of Luke's (22:39ff.) that many of us knew right along: that the Philistines. In the wonder-working, prays to escape from his fate (in an unap- fundamentalists don't know scripture and truth-revealing savior who speaks to them proved text, he is so fearful that he sweats know even less about the divinity of Jesus. in the pages of the New Testament they blood) and then bellows at his closest fol- In the last week I have seen a dozen spokes- detect no essential or complete humanity. lowers for their inattention during a time men for various orthodoxies waving an un- This was driven home to me most force- of crisis. Surely the gospel writers intended opened Bible in front of a camera with the fully when one of Last Temptation's detrac- the jeer of onlookers at the scene of the cruci- challenge—usually to an equally uninformed tors, waving his red-letter edition of the King fixion (with Wisdom 2 and Psalm 22 in view) representative of a liberal - religious posi- James Version proudly at the camera, de- as what Catholics used to call "an occasion tion—to prove from scripture that Jesus did clared: "The plain truth is that Jesus was of sin"—a testing of moral strength and the things Scorsese makes him do. With an never tempted." human resolve. To say that Jesus was not apologetic fervor that only comes easily to To quote Harry Truman: Show me. My tempted is so far from being what the letter the uninformed, they maintain that any film non-red-lettered edition of the Oxford of the scripture says that anyone who that prostitutes the picture of Jesus sup- Annotated Bible says that following Jesus' believes this claims to be a biblical literalist posedly given in the (unopened) Bible should baptism "The spirit drove him out into the should at once resign his title. To say that be censured. desert ... and he was tempted by Satan." the Jesus of the New Testament is invulner- There is a history to the fundamentalist Matthew (4:1ff.) and Luke (4:1ff.) support able to temptation cheapens (Chalcedon: view of the Bible that extends far back into Mark's story and elaborate on the allusion. "confuses") the humanity and leaves us with the recesses of early Christianity. Its particu- They do not suggest that Jesus was invul- a smiling alien without will, without logic, larism is that of the gnostics, who rejected nerable to temptation—he merely overcame without compassion; a shell inhabited by the the pluralism of the mainstream churches it. The standard view of the temptation of mind and purposes of God. I submit that of their day and set about rewriting and sup- Jesus in the desert is that it illustrates his the fundamentalist Jesus is a gnostic body- plementing the Gospels used in the "orth- humanity—his human strength to resist the snatcher and not the biblical-historical Jesus odox" churches of Rome and its empire. lure of wealth, power, and the princely Satan of Nazareth. The fundamentalists, like their What makes the gnostic heresy an interesting who could have provided him with his heart's gnostic prototypes, have little need for a analogue of modern fundamentalism is that desire. The fundamentalist exegesis of the human Jesus since the primary function of the former, like the latter, had only one string story parallels that of the gnostics of old: their Christ is to get people saved. Such a on its theological harp. The Gnostics the story is told to make the point that, being Jesus needs neither will nor compassion; his believed in the total spirituality of Jesus God, Jesus could not have been tempted, physical presence is a necessary convenience. Christ, whereas the mainstream churches, since being tempted would detract from his I do not regard the gospel stories of the forced into compromise by a dizzying variety divinity. Various church fathers from the temptation of Christ as historical. They are of beliefs, believed that Jesus was human time of Irenaeus (ca. 180 cE) condemned simply mythical embodiments of the belief and divine. what was then the gnostic and was to become that Jesus of Nazareth had greater than Fundamentalists claim to believe in the the fundamentalist interpretation by insist- average power to resist the tempter. Beneath humanity of Jesus. In fact, many would think ing that Jesus was not preserved from that conviction, however, is the prior as- that the gentle Jesus of Aunt Charlotte's temptation but from sin: how could strength, sumption of his mortality—and, as I read Bible Tales and Sunday School picnics is human or divine, be calculated in the absence the gospels, there was little reluctance in the about as human as Jesus can get. The truth— of attraction and resistance? How could earliest church to depict that mortality in as Edwin Meese has been fond of saying— someone ignorant of human nature intend broad and earthy strokes. My non-red-letter lies elsewhere. Fundamentalists are tho- to die for the sins of the world and for the Bible, in fact, yields to scholarly inferences roughly confused about the ancient creed wickedness of his generation? The early a Jesus far more engaged in things of the they continually cite (and continually mis- writers responded—chiefly against the world, the flesh, and the devil than the Jesus pronounce: Kal-SEE-don) against Scorsese's gnostics and assorted other heretics— that of story and film. This Jesus may have been film. They are confused in that their "biblical "what was not acquired [flesh] was not illegitimate, and was thought to be so by historical Jesus," like the Jesus of the redeemed [mankind]," a typically enigmatic his prospective stepfather (Matt. 1:18); he

54 FREE INQUIRY may—as his Jewish opponents alleged for without the realization of what a life lived attractive enough to warrant their giving up centuries—have been the son of a prostitute. otherwise might have been is not godly but nets and sheep and a healthy sex life? When He had no mission of his own, but inherited subhuman. So, I submit, is the heretical the film shows us scoffers, hecklers, and one (with difficulty) from his teacher, John Christ of the fundamentalists. head-waggers at the foot of the cross, we're the Baptist, whose disciples (also with diffi- When the shouting dies down and the on their side to the end. Jesus' silence before culty) finally accepted him rather than John queues dwindle, The Last Temptation of Pilate reminds us not so much of the Suf- as the messiah promised in scripture. He so Christ will be seen for what it is: proof that fering Servant of Isaiah's prophecy as of a confused his disciples and his family with a film need not be good to be important. particularly dumb pupil being scolded by a his teaching (Luke 9:45, pars.; 8:21f., pars.) The film is important, if for no other priggish teacher. Worst, the Jesus of the that they tried to silence him and bring him reason than that it deprives us of the card- crucifixion-fantasy stumbles through his home, in reprisal for which he disowned his board cut-out Jesus of Hollywood epics. temptation like Scrooge through dreams of mother and brothers. His grumblings against Instead of the parable-spouting guru who Christmas past. His humanity, as a result the Law, against the abuses of the Temple wiles away his time in the pleasant groves of his trance-like participation in family life, cult (not unusual among the radical preach- of the Galilean hill-country, Scorsese serves becomes more incredible than his divinity. ers in his day) resulted in a plot to assassi- up (a la Kazantzakis) a guilt-possessed capi- The film has its moments. The via- nate him or to turn him over to Roman tulator whose messianic pretensions have no dolorosa scene is visually moving, the crank authorities (Luke 23:2). place in the politically electrified climate of alleys of the ancient city scarcely yielding There is no doubt in my mind that such Roman-occupied Palestine. It may have to the condemned man's agonized progress a Jesus, if this is indeed the historical been so: anyone claiming to be God's towards death. And no film has ever de- character underlying the encomium and anointed general—which is, after all, what picted more realistically or more accurately hagiography of the gospel accounts, might the messiah was supposed to be—might well the mechanics of Roman capital have tried to salvage his mission and his have been considered crazy. But this punishment. teaching by embracing rather than evading Nazarene lacks credentials ("Can anything It has its errors: no effigy of the Roman his death. The gospels say unequivocally that good come out of Nazareth?" asks Natha- emperor stood within the temple precinct; he died a failure—though the theological niel), ambition (a steadfast Judas finds Jesus' its looming presence as a backdrop to the interpretation given his execution (following predictions of his own death nonsensical: entry of the brigand Jesus-followers into the "prophecy" of Isaiah 52, beloved of the what would such a death accomplish for the Jerusalem looks not ominous but inept. In early church) was that his death was a dis- Jews?), and a clear sense of mission (hanging the temptation-sequence of the burning of guised triumph. They declare that his disci- on the cross, he looks back upon his life Jerusalem, panicky women shout, "They've ples gave up on him and retreated to the as a series of wrong turns). In short, he is stolen the ark of the covenant from the hill country at the time of his arrest, and not a messiah at all. His followers are con- temple!" This is surprising news indeed, since that his only loyal followers were Mary fused and uncommitted. But then, so is it wasn't there to begin with. Roman-style Magdalene, Susanna, the wife of Herod's Jesus, who spends most of his pre-baptism (open) prostitution has been transplanted to steward, Chuza, Joanna, "and many others." career in the desert trying to "find" himself, puritanical Jerusalem, gratuitously, it seems, They are with him in Bethany; they are with or find God, or find out whether they are to point out that Jesus' confusions also have him "looking on from afar" at the time of one and the same. genital implications. But never mind; when his death, and they alone remember to per- Although present only to provide an Jesus shifts from turn-the-other-cheek ideal- form the ablutions following his burial. I army for their reckless captain, the disciples ism to beat-your-ploughshares-into-swords am less interested in whether any of this is are at their cinematic best when Scorsese militancy—an overneat bifurcation nowhere factual than in what the New Testament says: turns their campfire discussions into a chatty to be found in the gospels—he comes sud- it says that Jesus spent a great deal of time Shabat dinner at Uncle Joshua's. Unfor- denly, if temporarily, alive—a bandanna- among women with questionable repu- tunately, their studied bumptiousness does sporting Che Gueverra who bleeds on the tations. nothing to improve the overall effect of the pavement but then wilts into the arms of I would not want to suggest that the film. Scorsese found beneath Kazantzakis's Judas. fundamentalist Jesus does not exist in the sinuous language a revisionist Jesus who And the film also has its failed preten- New Testament. The water-walking healer, has—since the novel was written almost forty sions. An encounter between the fantasizing the multiplier of loaves, the revealer of divine years ago—passed into scholarship, pop- Christ and a newly zealous Saul/Paul, just truth, is certainly there. But that Jesus has theology, and even sermonizing. But the in from Damascus, is spoiled by somebody's no life-history, no pulse. His actions are self- failed political rebel has become a cliche', directive that Paul should be played as referring and without result or complication. and Scorsese has tried to mask his discovery Morey Amsterdam would play Jimmy His life, indeed his sacrifice, has no meaning of this with mundane stage-business, cute- Swaggart. Yet we remember what Kazant- because in the long run sacrifice must be talk, and simplistic special effects. zakis has written when the two come face measured as a willingness to give up what In the long run, the film cannot succeed to face: Jesus accuses Paul of not knowing rightfully belongs to a person. In traditional because it is an interpretation of an interpre- what he's talking about since he's never seen Christianity, that willingness is the essence tation. What the literary Kazantzakis the man in person. "I'm glad I met you— of Jesus' triumph, and it depends on the achieves in his lyrical novel, the film squan- whoever you are," Paul responds, "because recognition that his humanity—his life— ders and then clutches—all too artificially now I can forget all about you." This film belongs entirely to him. It is against the to regain. Willem Dafoe makes a terrible should be seen for the same reason. temptation to hold on to it that he strug- Jesus. The fault lies not so much with the gles and it is his overcoming that temptation casting—or miscasting (which is the movie's R. Joseph Hoffmann is with the Committee for that consecrates his human existence. A only consistent element)—as with the script. the Scientific Examination of Religion and Jesus not thus tempted is heretical. Christ Who could have found the confusions of professor of religion at Hartwick College. without a cross, without agony and passion, this unappealing, identityless preacher

Fall 1988 55 (Letters continued from p. 3) children are those who cannot find the limits tion unnecessary? If God, the fountain of gions in the modern world is offset to some of their behavior—those who are allowed all moral law, himself performs an abortion, extent by the rise of new cults, especially to do almost anything they please. Children's then abortion can't be morally wrong, can in America, where, as Bainbridge notes, even "misbehavior" is often an expression of the it? university students remain "woefully ig- fact that they are constantly groping and Isn't it odd that God would be so so- norant ... of the general theories of nature probing to get a definition from their elders licitous of the good doctor's sensibilities, but advanced by science." Throughout the rest of the boundaries of their behavioral world would let 1500 people perish on the Titanic; of the world, however, university students beyond which they must not trespass. let hundreds of thousands of people cruelly study science diligently, and seem to be The Bhagwan's grandparents had created starve to death in Africa; let numberless dispensing with unverifiable (and therefore an emotional environment in which he could children across our land be abused, raped, unreliable) supernatural "compensators." not acquire the skills of social interaction and beaten to death; let millions of his chosen that form an essential component of the people be tortured and murdered in Hitler's Richard J. Burke healthy human psyche. Once he was thrust ovens, and so on? Rochester, Mich. into society on his own as a young man, What a strange creature this God is! I the rug was pulled out from under him, so think he needs to reorder his priorities. to speak. Lacking the emotional support of One World Government his grandparents and virtually all social David H. Brown skills, he was probably ostracized—and, for Sierra Vista, Ariz. I am surprised that so many participants in the highly social human animal, this is disas- the Symposium (Summer 1988) hold the idea trous. His self-esteem had been built on his of world government as an attainable goal, relationship with his grandparents and when Inner Voices? and pretty much as the salvation of the this was gone, so was his self-esteem. He world. became just another drop in the ocean, a While the majority of Paul Kurtz's review Look around. Is there the slightest bit non-person. The next step was to sink into of I. F. Stone's "The Trail of Socrates" of evidence that the lion will lie down with near or total insanity and retreat back to (Summer 1988) was a fair and well-reasoned the lamb, that any nation, now or ever, will the ambience of his childhood where "there treatment of the topic and the book, I found voluntarily give up its sovereignty and inde- was no limitation ... I could do anything the last paragraph rather ironic. pendence and turn itself over to some super- whatsoever." In that state of mind, he could What great irony did I find there? Well, government? There is no sign of peace retaliate for the negative feedback he got in the first sentence of that paragraph, Mr. between the Moslems and Jews, or between from others by feeling infinitely superior to Kurtz states that a modern (humanist?) Moslem sects. World government is un- and more powerful than them. writer might reject Socrates' insistence that thinkable amid racism, religious rivalry, eth- The moral to be drawn from Dr. Clarke's he had a "diamon," or "inner voice." Such nic friction, and hate. How do we eliminate article is that children need, seek, and should a denial of "interior guidance" may indeed all this? How long will it take? Self-interest be provided with limits, the best of which seem reasonable to most modern secular among individuals, groups, associations, are fairly broad but consistent, providing humanists but I find this enigmatic because churches, cities, countries, and nations is room for exploration and experiment. The it is exactly the opinion clung to by every perhaps the strongest motivation affecting moral to be drawn from the Rajneeshee red-blooded fundamentalist Christian in this the beliefs, decisions, and actions of people movement and other cults is, beware of those country. everywhere. When we find suburban resi- who claim to have The Answer. This, in turn, The other day while watching one of the dents fighting ferociously to escape annex- addresses the question posed by another plethora of religious-right television shows ation by the bordering big city, what chance article in the same issue of FREE INQUIRY: that abound on my local cable system, I is there for a world government? "Is Belief in the Supernatural Inevitable?" heard a well known "televangelist/journa- We would do better by directing our The answer is yes, as long as there are list/candidate" (Pat Robertson, in other attention to more easily managed problems, people for whom there has to be a simple words) taking the New Age Movement to in those areas maybe we might make a answer for all problems, and who allow task because they believe in what he called difference. World government is to the themselves to be hoodwinked by charlatans the "Divine Spark" in each of us. I couldn't humanist what heaven is to the Christian. who claim to provide it. Since no simple help but wonder if Mr. Kurtz would have answer exists in reality, it must inevitably been surprised to find himself arguing from Russell E. Simmons be expressed in terms of the supernatural. his man's corner. Raton, N.M. But putting personal belief aside (for Anthony Florence neither Mr. Robertson nor Mr. Kurtz has Albuquerque, N.M. anything more insightful than that to offer Superegos and the Supernatural us on this issue), no amount of objection on moral or scientific grounds can make such Reading Ronald O. Clarke's profile of Raj- More On Immaculate Abortion "inner whisperings" go away. Certainly, as neesh, I was at first tempted to scorn all Mr. Kurtz also states in his last paragraph, the theorizing and dismiss the Bhagwan Let us suppose for the moment that the Socrates' intimations of reincarnation and simply as an arrogant charlatan and a lar- alleged medical miracle reported by Dr. premonitions of immortality are easily cenous scoundrel. But, reading on, I found Eastlund (Summer 1988) is true. This raises disregarded (and probably with his blessing, myself feeling pity and compassion for Shree some interesting questions. I might add, for I think he would have Rajneesh the unhappy child. Why wouldn't God simply correct the admitted that these were nothing more than As a father and former teacher, I am mother's medical abnormality, allowing her his own hopes and wishes), but the reality convinced that among the unhappiest to have a normal baby and making an abor- of these "sparks" cannot be negated or

56 FREE INQUIRY declared nonexistent, no matter whether it where offers an explanation of his own as eluding those who are religious, it cannot is men of science or men of God who have to why Socrates was condemned.... Why subscribe to a belief system that parts with chosen to declare them so. Fortunately, was he condemned, Professor Kurtz? the rational approach. ignoring or denying reality does nothing to I look forward to the development of make real things go away and, no matter Guy W. Moore a more clearly defined purpose and organ- how blissful and all-knowing an aura ig- Arlington, Va. ized structure for secular humanists in the norance induces, ignorance is always not future. knowing and, as such, is not a substitute Paul Kurtz responds: for knowledge and understanding. One cannot say precisely, but there were Henry Davies In fact, to my mind, a reasonable ex- several reasons. Clearly, there were political East London, South Africa planation for the profound insights that reasons, as Stone points out. But also, come through dreams, intuitions, and "inner according to the indictment, Socrates was lights" is not only the greatest challenge for viewed as an atheist who sought to under- Music to Our Ears the fundamentalists (for it seems likely that mine the morals of the youth of Athens. He Jesus relied on such "voices"), but is also no doubt provoked the Athenians during his I have just read "The Secular Requiem" by the main element that leaves much of hu- defense. Perhaps he also had a martyr Richard Chon (Summer 1988). While I am manism sounding like a clanging cymbal, to complex. What I object to in Stone's retrial not familiar with Kurt Vonnegut's version borrow a phrase from Paul, née Saul of of Socrates is that Stone emphasizes of the requiem, I think an important point Tarsis. Modern Science and Humanism have Socrates' ideological/political views and was missed. yet to come up with a logical explanation ignores his profound contributions to The idea of a more human-oriented for this phenomenon, even if that explan- philosophy. requiem has already been realized in "Ein ation was not lacking in the philosophies Deutsches Requiem," Op. 45 of Johannes of humanists like Socrates, who, being closer Brahms. I can do no better than to quote to the original Greek, probably realized that Humanism in South Africa from Karl Geiringer's definitive biography, the root of our word "enthusiasm" was "en Brahms, His Life and Work (pp. 310-311): theos," or, quite literally, "The God Within." I am convinced that the need for Secular "In many respects the Requiem occupies (Who claimed that the first of anything is Humanism in South Africa has grown in a unique position among the works of the usually the best?) the last few years, particularly in view of master. Despite all his dependence on the I also find it most ironic that some of the increased suppression of democracy im- art of the past, here the master decisively the greatest scientific discoveries have been posed by the ruling nationalist government strikes into new paths ... The difference awakened during man's dream state. The fact and by state-backed church authorities. The resides not merely in the fact that [other] that Descartes came upon the scientific freedom of the media in South Africa has masters faithfully adhered to the Latin words method in a dream is lost on most scientists, been curbed significantly. The Bureau for prescribed by the Roman Catholic Liturgy, but I doubt Descartes would have passed Information (a government body) releases whereas Brahms chose his own texts from over this fact so lightly. Or how about the to the newspapers the contents of various the German Bible; far more essential are the double helix configuration of DNA? I can't reports. The SATV is directly controlled by differences in the content and tendency of even remember the name of the guy who the government and we are thoroughly in- the two texts. The Latin requiem is a prayer uncovered it, but from what I hear, he did doctrinated with the Christian view and the for the peace of the dead, threatened with so just after having taken a nap. Nationalist government's principles by daily the horrors of the Last Judgment; Brahms's I realize that this doesn't prove anything, dosages on TV. Requiem, on the contrary, utters words of but then, what is proved by those who say Your articles on breaking with old hu- consolation, designed to reconcile the living this sort of thing can't and therefore doesn't manism are relevant (Winter 1987/88). In with the ideas of suffering and death. In the happen? fact, I tried some time ago to address the liturgical text whole sentences are filled with difficulty by writing out what I considered the darkest menace; in Brahms's Requiem Bruce Clements to be out the "mission" of humanists in South each of the seven sections closes in a mood Falls Church, Va. Africa and came up with the following: of cheerful confidence or loving promise. "In Brahms's work all mention of the 1) To provide a forum for poten- name of Christ is expressly avoided. Al- After reading The Trial of Socrates by I. F. tial humanists to share in the thinking though the work of [Brahms] is firmly rooted Stone I felt that at long last I understood of humanists past and present on a in the Christian faith, it is wholly removed why he was condemned. Then I read Paul global scale. from dogma in the narrower sense. It is, Kurtz's review of the book and now I am 2) To facilitate the process wher- indeed, addressed to all who believe, ir- uncertain what to think. eby an individual can examine tradi- respective of creed." I suppose Professor Kurtz was reacting tional values critically. Brahms knew that religion ought to be as a professional philosopher in attacking 3) To promote the employment of primarily concerned with this life, not with Stone's lack of philosophical sophistication reason (rational thinking) exclusively a dubious hereafter. He intentionally ex- (which, he implies, is below that of many in formulating views and values. presses his requiem in the language of his undergraduate students) but I for one felt culture: words of challenge, defiance, peace- that it was unworthy of Kurtz to resort to It serves no purpose, in my opinion, to ful resignation, gentle solace, hope. He might name-calling ("life-long liberal," "muckrak- avoid the issue of secularism. To regard as well have titled it "A Human Requiem." ing"). In fact, Kurtz used his entire two pages humanism as a religion is a blatant contra- of the review to belittle Stone and his "in diction in terms. While secular humanism Robert Morss many ways infuriating book," but he no- should respect the viewpoints of others, in- Norwalk, Conn.

Fall 1988 57 picture of the visitor—a bearded, intense- looking man with swarthy looks and white robes—the paper asked "Did Jesus Christ In the Name of God Come To Nairobi?" and carried an eyewit- ness account by a staff reporter who was present. According to reporter Job Mutungi, dozens of people collapsed as the robed man What a Date You Have In Jesus less than 444.6 C., the temperature at which strolled through the prayer meeting after brimstone or sulpher changes from a liquid being introduced by local evangelist prea- Washington, D.C.—The Reagan Ad- to a gas. cher, Mary Akatsa. ministration's "chastity law" permits Federal "Revelations 21:8: 'But the fearful and Mary Akatsa maintained the man was funds to be given to religious groups that unbelieving ... shall have their part in the no fake. (AP). try to curb teenage sex. And it continues lake which burneth with fire and brimstone.' to be abused, at least according to critics "A lake of molten brimstone has a tem- of the law. You be the judge. One Virginia perature below the brimstone boiling point, UFO Chair Puts Vatican religious group used its $150,000 grant to which is 444.6 C. Above that point it would Light-Years Ahead produce a pamphlet counseling teenagers to be a vapor, not a lake. "act like Jesus would if he were on a date." "Thus, we have a temperature of 525 C. The Vatican is training priests for missionary Another group counsels its teen members in heaven, while the temperature in hell is work in outer space. The Alphonsianum that condoms cause birth defects. Chastity less than 445 C. Therefore, heaven is hotter Academy, a Catholic university in Rome, can be a good secular value, says one of than hell. " (Fresno Bee) has set up a UFO chair to prepare clerics the law's detractors, but in the hands of to convert whatever aliens may turn up. religious groups, it invariably becomes en- Vatican theologian Pierre Thorel told the twined with religion. (East West) Report: Christ Spotted in Kenya London Evening News: "We can neither ignore space exploration, nor the possibility Nairobi, Kenya—The official Kenya Times of meeting other living creatures." Michael Temperature In Heaven May Be newspaper yesterday reported the second Luckman, director of the New York Center Hotter Than Hell coming of Christ, but that report was di- for UFO Research, said: "This is a serious minished somewhat by the fact that the paper acknowledgment that UFO aliens are real." "The temperature of heaven can be rather is conducting a big circulation drive under The move came after scientists at the Vatican accurately determined by biblical authority," the tutelage of a team of British tabloid Observatory reportedly spotted UFOs. says [a] mathematician [who signs his letter experts. (Eavesdropping) Anthony] He cites Isaiah 30:26: "Moreover Attendees of a prayer meeting at a Nai- the light of the moon shall be as the light robi slum said a white-robed "Messiah"ap- of the sun and the light of the sun shall be peared before them, then vanished at the No. Robertson Says the Lord Led Him sevenfold, as the light of seven days." 56 bus stop down the road, the paper said. Into Failed Bid for GOP Nomination "Thus," deduces mathematician An- In a center-page spread that included a thony, "heaven receives from the moon as Virginia Beach, Va.—Pat Robertson re- much radiation as we do from the sun and, turned to his Christian Broadcasting Net- in addition, seven times seven (49) times as work's "700 Club" program and said "the much as the earth does from the sun, or Lord led me" into his failed bid for the GOP 50 times in all. presidential nomination. "The light we receive from the moon is "Obviously the question is, if he called a ten-thousandth of the light we receive from you, why didn't you win? Well, there's no the sun, so we can ignore that. With these .;•.x ',' doubt in my mind, absolutely none what- Y4LAP data we can continue to compute the tem- LO iTC LNG • S soever, that the Lord led me to do this," perature of heaven. ;$ McAPS he said. (AP) "The radiation falling on heaven will heat YQV~11 *5058 it to the point where the heat loss by radi- ation is just equal to the heat received by T Australia Is Opening A New radiation. In other words, heaven loses 50 le Parliament House times as much heat as the earth by radiation. "Using the Stefan Boltzmann fourth- On the topic of the day—the new legisla- power for radiation: ture—News Diary is happy to know that the House will be blessed by 20,000 Chris- a tians, members of the National Christian =50 ~ E Alliance, who are traveling to the national capital for the event. Where E is the absolute temperature of ~ .-v.. .. Of course, this presents an enormous the earth, 300K, this gives H as 798K or catering problem. But we learn that the 525 degrees Celsius. The exact temperature ..Oh, It's not like you thought it would be. Christians will be fed by the Lions. (Age) of hell cannot be computed, but it must be Well, nothing ever is, buster!" 58 FREE INQUIRY Council for Democratic and Secular Humanism (CODESH) The Council for Democratic and Secular Humanism (CODESH) is a not-for-profit, tax-exempt educational organization dedicated to fostering the growth of the traditions of democracy, secular humanism, and the principles of free inquiry in contemporary society. In addition to publishing FREE INQUIRY magazine and the Secular Humanist Bulletin, C0DESH sponsors the Academy of Humanism and the Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion. The Academy of Humanism The Academy of Humanism was established to recognize distinguished humanists and disseminate humanistic ideals and beliefs. The members of the Academy, listed below, are nontheists who are (1) devoted to free inquiry in all fields of human endeavor, (2) committed to a scientific outlook and the use of the scientific method in acquiring knowledge, and (3) upholders of humanist ethical values and principles. The Academy's goals include furthering respect for human rights and freedom and the dignity of the individual, tolerance of various viewpoints and willingness to compromise, commitment to social justice, a universalistic perspective that transcends national, ethnic, religious, sexual, and racial barriers, and belief in a free and open pluralistic and democratic society.

Humanist Laureates: Steve Allen, author, humorist; Isaac Asimov, author; Sir Alfred J. Ayer, 0xford; Kurt Baier, professor of philosophy, University of Pittsburgh; Sir Isaiah Berlin, professor of philosophy, Oxford University; Sir Hermann Bondi, professor of applied mathematics, Univ. of London; Bonnie Bullough, dean of nursing, SUNY at Buffalo; Mario Bunge, professor of philosophy of science, McGill Univ.; Bernard Crick, professor of politics, Univ. of London; Francis Crick, Nobel Laureate in Physiology, Salk Inst.; Joseph Delgado, chairperson of the Dept. of Neuropsychiatry, Univ. of Madrid; Milovan Djilas, author, former vice-president of Yugoslavia; Jean Dommanget, director, Royal Observatory of Belgium; Paul Edwards, professor of philosophy, Brooklyn College; Sir Raymond Firth, professor emeritus of anthropology, Univ. of London; Joseph Fletcher, theologian, professor emeritus of medical ethics, Univ. of Virginia Medical School; Betty Friedan, author and founder of the National Organization for Women (NOW); Yves Galifret, professor of physiology at the Sorbonne and director of l'Union Rationaliste; John Galtung, professor of sociology, Univ. of Oslo; Stephen Jay Gould, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard; Adolf Griinbaum, professor of philosophy, Univ. of Pittsburgh; Murray Gell-Mann, professor of physics, California Institute of Technology; Herbert Hauptman, Nobel Laureate and professor of biophysical science, SUNY at Buffalo; Donald Johanson, Inst. of Human 0rigins; Franco Lombardi, professor of philosophy, Univ. of Rome; Jolé Lombardi, organizer of the New Univ. for the Third Age; André Lwoff, Nobel Laureate in Medicine and professor of science, Institut Pasteur; Paul MacCready, Kremer Prize winner for aeronautical achievements; Mahailo Markovié, professor of philosophy, Univ. of Belgrade; John Passmore, professor of philosophy, Australian National Univ.; Jean-Claude Pecker, professor of astrophysics, Collège de France, Académie des Sciences; Wardell Baxter Pomeroy, psychotherapist and author; Sir Karl Popper, professor emeritus of logic and scientific method, Univ. of London; W. V. Quine, professor of philosophy, Harvard; Max Rood, professor of law and former Minister of Justice in Holland; Richard Rorty, professor of philosophy, University of Virginia; Carl Sagan, astronomer, Cornell; Andrei Sakharov, physicist, Nobel Peace Prize winner; Svetozar Stojanovic, professor of philosophy, Univ. of Belgrade; Thomas Szasz, professor of psychiatry, SUNY Medical School; V. M. Tarkunde, chairman, Indian Radical Humanist Association; Richard Taylor, professor of philosophy, Union College; Alberto Hidalgo Tulión, president of the Sociedad Asturiana de Filosofía, Oviedo, Spain; G. A. Wells, professor of German, Univ. of London; Edward O. Wilson, professor of sociobiology, Harvard; Lady Barbara Wootton, former Deputy Speaker, House of Lords. Deceased: George O. Abell, Brand Blanshard, Lawrence Kohlberg, Ernest Nagel, George Olincy, Chaim Perelman.

Secretariat: Vern Bullough, dean of natural and social sciences, SUNY College at Buffalo; Antony Flew, professor emeritus of philosophy, Reading Univ.; Sidney Hook, professor emeritus of philosophy, New York Univ.; Paul Kurtz, professor of philosophy, SUNY at Buffalo, editor of FREE INQUIRY; Gerald Larue, professor emeritus of archaeology and biblical studies, Univ. of Southern California at Los Angeles. Executive Director: Steven L. Mitchell. Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion (CSER) The Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion was developed to examine the claims of Eastern and Western religions and of well- established and newer sects and denominations in the light of scientific inquiry. The Committee is interdisciplinary, including specialists in biblical scholarship, archaeology, linguistics, anthropology, the social sciences, and philosophy who represent differing secular and religious traditions. Committee members are dedicated to impartial scholarship and the use of objective methods of inquiry. Gerald Larue (President), USC at Los Angeles; Robert S. Alley, professor of humanities, Univ. of Richmond; Michael Arnheim, professor of ancient history, Univ. of Witwatersrand (South Africa); Joseph Barnhart, professor of philosophy, North Texas State Univ.; Vern Bullough, SUNY College at Buffalo; Joseph Fletcher, Univ. of Virginia Medical School; Antony Flew, Reading Univ. (England); Theodor Gaster, Professor Emeritus of Religion, Columbia University and professor of religion, University of Florida; Van Harvey, professor of religion, Stanford; Sidney Hook, New York Univ.; Robert Joly, professor philosophy, Université de Mons (Belgium); Paul Kurtz, SUNY at Buffalo; Ron Lindsay, attorney, Washington, D.C.; William V. Mayer, director, Biological Sciences Curriculum Study, Univ. of Colorado; Delos McKown, professor of philosophy, Auburn Univ.; John F. Priest, professor of religion, Florida State University; James Robinson, director of the Institute for Christianity and Antiquity, Claremont College; George Smith, president, Signature Books; Morton Smith, Professor Emeritus of History, Colombia University; A. T. Steegman, professor of anthropology, SUNY at Buffalo; G. A. Wells, Univ. of London. Biblical Criticism Research Project (CSER Subcommittee) R. Joseph Hoffmann (Chairman), professor of philosophy and religion, Hartwick College; David Noel Freedman, professor of Old Testament, Univ. of Michigan; Randel Helms, professor of English, Arizona State Univ.; Robert Joly, professor of philosophy, Centre Interdisciplinaire d'Etudes Philosophiques de l'Université de Mons (Belgium); Carol Meyers, professor of religion, Duke Univ.; James Robinson, director, Inst. for Antiquity and Christianity, Claremont College; John F. Priest, professor and chairman, Dept. of Religion, Florida State Univ.; Morton Smith, professor of history, Columbia. Faith-Healing Investigation Project (CSER Subcommittee) David Alexander, special investigator; Robert S. Alley, Univ. of Richmond; Luis W. Alvarez, Professor Emeritus of Physics, Univ. of California; Stephen Barrett, M.D., consumer health advocate; Bonnie Bullough, SUNY at Buffalo; Shawn Carlson, Lawrence Berkeley Labs; Joseph Fletcher, Univ. of Virginia Medical School; William Jarvis, chairman, Dept. of Public Health Science, Loma Linda Univ., California; Richard H. Lange, M.D., chief of nuclear medicine, Ellis Hospital, Schenectady, N.Y.; Gary Posner, M.D., St. Petersburg, Florida; Wallace I. Sampson, M.D., Stanford; Robert Steiner, chairman, 0ccult Committee, Society of American Magicians; Rita Swan, President, Children's Health Care Is a Legal Duty, Sioux City, Iowa.

Coordinating Council: Joseph Barnhart, Paul Kurtz, Gerald Larue, and James Randi, conjurer and principal investigator of the Project. The Affirmations of Humanism: A Statement of Principles and Values

• We are committed to the application of reason and science to the understanding of the universe and to the solving of human problems. • We deplore efforts to denigrate human intelligence, to seek to explain the world in super- natural terms, and to look outside nature for salvation. • We believe that scientific discovery and technology can contribute to the betterment of human life. • We believe in an open and pluralistic society and that democracy is the best guarantee of protecting human rights from authoritarian elites and repressive majorities. • We are committed to the principle of the separation of church and state. • We cultivate the arts of negotiation and compromise as a means of resolving differences and achieving mutual understanding. • We are concerned with securing justice and fairness in society and with eliminating dis- crimination and intolerance. • We believe in supporting the disadvantaged and the handicapped so that they will be able to help themselves. • We attempt to transcend divisive parochial loyalties based on race, religion, nationality, creed, class, or ethnicity, and strive to work together for the common good of humanity. • We want to protect and enhance the earth, to preserve it for future generations, and to avoid inflicting needless suffering on other species. • We believe in enjoying life here and now and in developing our creative talents to their fullest. • We believe in the cultivation of moral excellence. • We respect the right to privacy. Mature adults should be allowed to fulfill their aspirations, to express their sexual preferences, to exercise reproductive freedom, to have access to com- prehensive and informed health-care, and to die with dignity. • We believe in the common moral decencies: altruism, integrity, honesty, truthfulness, responsibility. Humanist ethics is amenable to critical, rational guidance. There are normative standards that we discover together. Moral principles are tested by their consequences. • We are deeply concerned with the moral education of our children. We want to nourish reason and compassion. • We are engaged by the arts no less than by the sciences. • We are citizens of the universe and are excited by discoveries still to be made in the cosmos. • We are skeptical of untested claims to knowledge, and we are open to novel ideas and seek new departures in our thinking. • We affirm humanism as a realistic alternative to theologies of despair and ideologies of violence and as a source of rich personal significance and genuine satisfaction in the service to others. • We believe in optimism rather than pessimism, hope rather than despair, learning in the place of dogma, truth instead of ignorance, joy rather than guilt or sin, tolerance in the place of fear, love instead of hatred, compassion over selfishness, beauty instead of ugliness, and reason rather than blind faith or irrationality. • We believe in the fullest realization of the best and noblest that we are capable of as human beings.